Capitalism is a marvel, can we all agree? It turns dust to diamonds. Nowhere is this basic truth more evident than during and after calamities, be they caused by nature, political unrest or disease. In fact, the phenomenon of profiting from disaster has proved so striking in its cold-bloodedness that a term was finally coined for it: “disaster capitalism.”

Price gouging is just one example. But unlike, say, buying up a poor, hurricane-flattened neighborhood for a song and constructing, in its place, luxury condos, gouging is immediately discernible and easier to target.

And in corona-plagued New York, cases of price-gouging have begun to abound in large enough numbers that several self-appointed watch dogs are investigating the matter.