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Are ticket touts economically efficient?

Graham Watson

31st October 2017

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Is ticket touting evidence of the market allocating resources efficiently, or, is it a market failure?

Read: Touts threaten UK's £4.5bn music industry, survey reveals

Well, if you're a classical economist, you'd argue that selling something to the highest bidder is evidence of efficiency.

And do we blame other people for reselling things at higher prices than they were originally sold for? That's arbitrage, and common in many markets.

Whilst I can understand people's frustrations, the real issue is that the face value of tickets for popular sports events and concerts is invariably too low.

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Graham Watson

Graham Watson has taught Economics for over twenty years. He contributes to Tutor2U, reads voraciously and is interested in all aspects of Teaching and Learning.

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