Is it stolen, or is it counterfeit?

1. If the price is too good to be true, then it is probably either stolen or counterfeit. It's a sad commentary on our society, but many E-Buyers don't mind that it's a steal, as long as it's real.
   
2. How do E-criminals get merchandise for their E-auctions? Since the price is too good to be true, one of two E-crime business models must be at play. Either it is stolen, or it is counterfeit.
   
3. The stolen merchandise model generally relies on "boosters" who work individually or in groups, sometimes stealing the merchandise to order from legitimate retailers. They may also use insiders, employees of retail stores or distribution warehouses. Some merchandise is stolen in transit, off the loading dock, out of the back of a truck. To be worthwhile to the E-criminal, the merchandise must be high in value and fungible.
   
4. The counterfeit merchandise model applies to goods that can be manufactured to order, often at a lower quality level than the real deal. Counterfeit items are branded, often luxury items. The authentic piece often has a storied name, a reputation associated with quality. It may sell for many times its cost of manufacture, at a price supported by both reputation and heavy marketing expense. It's possible that the E-buyer knows this and doesn't care. O.J. Simpson's Rolex watch, seized by the Goldman family, was a fake.
   
5. For both the stolen and counterfeit business models, the ratio of value to weight must be favorable. It's easy to deal in lithium batteries, flash memory cards, automotive headlights, and women's panties. Such items could be either stolen or counterfeit.
   
6. Although many counterfeits are luxury items, generic versions of mass-produced items are another big field for counterfeiters. Remember that Gillette loses money on razors in order to make money selling blades. Hewlett Packard makes up for skinny profit margins on printers with a profitable business in printer cartridges. So the counterfeit business model also applies to generic versions of mass-produced branded merchandise.
7. So you ask, how do can you find legitimate sellers on EBay? How can you avoid sellers in E-Auctions who do not acquire their merchandise through theft or counterfeiting? compete. The answer is, you can't. Bad sellers drive out good sellers. Gresham's Law, a famous maxim in economics, states that "Bad money drives out the good." (Think of the gold standard, in use throughout the world before World War I.) According to Gresham's Law, good money cannot remain in circulation with debased money, because it will be profitable to melt down good coins to produce debased coins. People who receive good coins will either melt them down to produce bad coins or hoard them, and spend only their bad money.
8. A corollary of Gresham's Law is that "even worse money drives out bad money"! What this means on EBay is, if it can be counterfeited more cheaply and reliably than it can be stolen, it is probably counterfeit.
   
9. Where does generic, mass produced counterfeit merchandise come from? Mass production requires economies of scale. In much of the world (in large areas of Asia, Africa, Latin America, the Middle East, and Eastern Europe), there is little effective enforcement of intellectual property laws. On paper, these countries appear to be very poor, most of them with per-capita GDP well under $10,000.00, and sometimes under $2,000.00. (By comparison, the USA had a per-capita GDP of about $47,000 in 2008.) In fact, although they are poor, many of these countries have thriving consumer markets in counterfeit merchandise, some of it very skillfully branded to look like genuine brand name products from the developed nations.