While I know next-to-nothing nothing about economics, I do know that after going to Six Flags Great Adventure in New Jersey this weekend, the free market can be a cold and unforgiving arbiter of pain.
As a Six Flags patron, you have to buy into the park’s insidious economy, and very quickly everything you knew about equity and price is re-calibrated.
There are water fountains, but their water was almost always warm or had just been slobbered on by a child, the frequency of such made me question whether or not these were just chance occurrences or if the park was paying eight-year-olds to contaminate the only free commodity in the park.
In comparison, $3.59 cold, sterile water was a deal. We bought several, and it hurt less each time. In a word combination I never thought could exist, I ate Six Flags sushi for lunch and washed it down with a Powerade for a cool $15.
My friend Kelly bought a $6 ice cream cone late in the afternoon, and at that point, it seemed like a fire sale. Despite these gluttonous profit margins, the clandestine economists behind this bastion of greed did not stop at charging outrageous prices just for food. Food, as it turned out, was just the beginning.
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