Stamp Market Low?

And the price that collector gets will probably still be higher than he would have gotten from a dealer, so it's a win-win, except of course for the dealer. That being said, I'd hate to see full-time dealers disappear from the market forever. Many of them become recognized experts in their fields and they are trusted sources of material that may be risky to buy from other collectors. While I buy low-end and middling material on ebay all day long, there are some issues I'd hesitate to buy there, at least from the vast majority of sellers.

I collect 19th-century stamps, and sell my duplicates on ebay since 1990s. While recently I observe some slump in prices for common and average-quality material (several very good reasons for that are given above by others), compared to 20 years ago, high-quality and rare material is holding well.

I think there are enough collectors in the classic area, maybe even more then before. As opposed to the stamp prices, the activity of the stamp market, however, is much lower than 15-20 years before.

The most serious recent problem is that today people have less money to buy stamps. Inflation, higher taxes, obstacles to private business and trade, endless expansion of government institutions and welfare, as well as wanton, irresponsible waste of taxpayer's money by demagogues and ideologues make the most active, hard-working people financially anemic and unwilling to spend — everyone is poorer, except the very few crooks and heirs on very top.

Health of the stamp market depends on the overall economic health of the society. Socialism takes life out of life and spreads misery, it is an enemy of the stamp collector, as it is of everyone else. Limit the overreaching government to its minimum, and everyone, including stamp collectors, shall be richer and happier.

Other things that are critical to philately include:

- commitment to a common set of facts, and

- respect for the varying backgrounds & tastes & interests of others.

Cheers,

/s/ ikeyPikey

Sure, ikeyPikey. I thank you for showing respect for my background, my tastes, and my interests.

More excerpts from the Tea Party Guide to Stamp Collecting.

GeoffHa,

You give me an excellent idea for a monograph title.
Adorable!

I recently started collecting German States and Reich. I'm amazed at prices; a lot of fine old material is not very expensive. It's coming in faster than I can mount it.

I withdrew from selling on ebay last August and hesitate to go back. I've got a lot of US material I'd like to sell, but I don't have much hape of moving it.

Don

tvorog:

I'm not sure what you mean by this;

" Socialism takes life out of life and spreads misery, it is an enemy of the stamp collector, as it is of everyone else. Limit the overreaching government to its minimum, and everyone, including stamp collectors, shall be richer and happier."

Joe

Could we please leave politics out of discussions about the stamp market? No good can come of it.

One issue that has not been discussed here ,that I think is important . We are not seeing the massive worldwide collections of the past , we are also not seeing huge dealer inventories of the past . There is a lot more specialization of collections and this also applies to dealer inventory.
I was surprised when I first got on the internet chat rooms and very few people could put up a scan of a stamp being discussed and that wasn't a expensive stamp ,sure someone who collected that country or area could show that stamp but as the various people came on asking for a view of some low value stamp ,so few could show it from their collection .
My point being a lot of collections today are much smaller in bulk and size as far as depth of content .

The best transformation the internet brought to philately is breaking the oligopoly that dominated the retail trade in material and creating a global marketplace easily accessible to those with access to modern communications technology. Now you can often look at fifty, a hundred, or more offerings of the same stamp you seek within minutes with a few clicks, and find the one that is the best combination of cost and condition for your budget and collecting tastes, rather than maybe having only one or two choices via visiting a traditional dealer or stamp show. So long as the retail trade was in the hands of a small number of "specialists" who could indeed set prices, now the marketplace is wide open and the competition to sell increased supply results, as the rules of economics dictate, that prices must fall until a new equilibrium between supply and demand is found based on a global marketplace, not merely regional ones.

The problem with so many listings of the same material ,you get what I call the "race to the bottom" each new seller who wants his material to sell, lowers his price below the previous offers.

One man's bug is another man's feature.

Unless of course you can have an item "graded" by an "expert" to be above a certain "standard" and thus create the sense that its grade makes it superior and thus more desirable to own. That is what all this grading nonsense (in my opinion) is all about, creating a new way to "limit" supply and drive prices up for certain material, with the kind of hype and appeal to the ego of those collectors for whom disposable income is no object and the ability to have the bragging rights that they can own "THE BEST (TM)" copy of a stamp available in the marketplace because of its "expert's grade".

For the vast majority of collectors of the middling sort for whom disposable income to enjoy the hobby is much more limited, the internet "race to the bottom" is a GOOD thing, so long as they keep in mind that they are buying for the enjoyment of the hobby, not as some "investment" that will bring returns above other forms of financial investment.

"Unless of course you can have an item "graded" by an "expert" to be above a certain "standard" and thus create the sense that its grade makes it superior and thus more desirable to own. That is what all this grading nonsense (in my opinion) is all about, creating a new way to "limit" supply and drive prices up for certain material, with the kind of hype and appeal to the ego of those collectors for whom disposable income is no object and the ability to have the bragging rights that they can own "THE BEST (TM)" copy of a stamp available in the marketplace because of its "expert's grade"."

You are exactly right.