Living in the Spirit

July 11, 2022

Scripture Reading: Amos 8:1-12

Hear this, you that trample on the needy,
   and bring to ruin the poor of the land,
saying, ‘When will the new moon be over
   so that we may sell grain;
and the sabbath,
   so that we may offer wheat for sale?
We will make the ephah small and the shekel great,
   and practice deceit with false balances,
buying the poor for silver
   and the needy for a pair of sandals,
   and selling the sweepings of the wheat.’ –Amos 8:4-6

I keep a supply of antacids at my house and buy them in large quantity bottles, thus I do not buy them often. I do not like to shop. I noticed the bottle was almost empty so I purchased a new one the next time I was in the pharmacy. When I picked up the bottle, I noticed that it was only about 75% full. I opened the lid to see if the seal had been broken and if the pills were missing. The seal was in place. I paid for the medicine and took it home. Since it is something, I routinely buy I did not read the labels. The old bottle indicated that it contained 160 tablets. The new label read 140 tablets. The price was the same for both. I guess the company had a backlog of bottles, so they used them and just changed the labels. The rules of supply and demand have been shattered by the COVID pandemic. We are struggling to find a new normal.

This, however, is a good time for us to consider how much our society is driven by greed. Price gouging because we can, is not acceptable. Reducing the number of pills in a bottle is not necessarily price gouging. It also was not a transparent increase in price. Pricing pharmaceuticals because they are desperately needed at higher and higher prices is greed. For example, insulin has been insulin for years. You may be able to obtain it in a fancier delivery system, but the medicine is still the same and should not cost more because lives depend on it. Oil companies control supply by whether they drill or not and whether they pump actual wells or not. Supply dictates the price they can charge for the oil they produce. They, indeed, may need to reinvest in drilling which will impact pricing, but they must not overdo it.

Prayer: Lord, help us to recognize greed for what it is and guide us to a better way of using our resources. Amen.

All scriptures are quoted from the New Revised Standard Version Bible: Anglicized Edition, copyright 1989, 1995, Division of Christian Education of the National Council of Churches of Christ in the United States of America. Used by permission. All rights are reserved.