When there's demand for a product or service, supply will follow if it's profitable(1) to sell. Banning something, or shaming people away from doing it, doesn't eliminate demand. Supply reduces, cost increases. If costs gets too high, demand vanishes, and so does supply. It functions like any other market would.
To squash a market entirely requires extremely strict laws, punishment, and enforcement. Even then, it's impossible to destroy some markets if enforcement cost is too high, or is incompatible with the rules of a society (e.g. it's un-Constitutional).
For example, the U.S. spends billions each year on the war on drugs, and yet there's someone sitting right next to me in a coffee shop I could probably buy some off of right now. If $500 billion was spent yearly on enforcement, and police could do random searches of persons and property at any time without warrant, drugs would dry up. But at what cost? The loss of many of our rights, plus extremely high taxes, followed by an inefficient society spending so many resources on, well, "You can't stick that pill in your mouth." We'd become a military state with little else to offer, stagnating while the rest of the world surpasses us.
Black markets can be risky to engage in. If the risk of getting caught buying or selling an exploit was, say, 24/7/365 physical torture for 10 years, most people probably wouldn't do it. But a few would remain if it is worth the risk to them, or if they fail to assess risk (e.g. they don't comprehend it, or they ignore it; "It won't happen to me!"). The black market would "harden".
Mexican drug cartels hardened with guns, violence, secrecy, corruption, torture and death. You can theoretically calculate how many humans died in Mexican drug wars, per-joint you smoked, in 2011. That cost was built into the price you paid for the drugs. This "death cost" goes away if you legalize it.
So you're absolutely right; markets for software exploits will not go away unless it becomes unprofitable, or not worthwhile. Right now there are few, if any laws, banning it (asides from extortion, treason laws, etc...). Since many are vocally against it, they only have a few options to "prevent" it. Shame those who do it, buy them out ($$$), race them (white hats), or propose legislation to ban it (good luck). This market is likely here to stay for some time. If it remains legalized and becomes accepted by the general community, more people would do it, prices would come down, and so would earnings.
(1) Profitability can be defined as anything the supplier receives in return for their product/service which they deem "worth" something. It doesn't have to be money, but could be good feelings, increased social capital, learned knowledge, etc...
> Mexican drug cartels hardened with guns, violence, secrecy, corruption, torture and death. You can theoretically calculate how many humans died in Mexican drug wars, per-joint you smoked, in 2011. That cost was built into the price you paid for the drugs. This "death cost" goes away if you legalize it.
For the record, you can do this with any product from any industry where fatalities ever occur during production and distribution. For example, the cost of teamster's deaths during delivery has been factored into the cost of products for hundred(s?) of years. Whether that death occurred because of overwork, robbery, or modern day road accidents, it's been accounted for.
People die of heatstroke farming the food you eat and the coffee you drink. And people die getting you the weed you smoke. I'd like to see data comparing them.
To squash a market entirely requires extremely strict laws, punishment, and enforcement. Even then, it's impossible to destroy some markets if enforcement cost is too high, or is incompatible with the rules of a society (e.g. it's un-Constitutional).
For example, the U.S. spends billions each year on the war on drugs, and yet there's someone sitting right next to me in a coffee shop I could probably buy some off of right now. If $500 billion was spent yearly on enforcement, and police could do random searches of persons and property at any time without warrant, drugs would dry up. But at what cost? The loss of many of our rights, plus extremely high taxes, followed by an inefficient society spending so many resources on, well, "You can't stick that pill in your mouth." We'd become a military state with little else to offer, stagnating while the rest of the world surpasses us.
Black markets can be risky to engage in. If the risk of getting caught buying or selling an exploit was, say, 24/7/365 physical torture for 10 years, most people probably wouldn't do it. But a few would remain if it is worth the risk to them, or if they fail to assess risk (e.g. they don't comprehend it, or they ignore it; "It won't happen to me!"). The black market would "harden".
Mexican drug cartels hardened with guns, violence, secrecy, corruption, torture and death. You can theoretically calculate how many humans died in Mexican drug wars, per-joint you smoked, in 2011. That cost was built into the price you paid for the drugs. This "death cost" goes away if you legalize it.
So you're absolutely right; markets for software exploits will not go away unless it becomes unprofitable, or not worthwhile. Right now there are few, if any laws, banning it (asides from extortion, treason laws, etc...). Since many are vocally against it, they only have a few options to "prevent" it. Shame those who do it, buy them out ($$$), race them (white hats), or propose legislation to ban it (good luck). This market is likely here to stay for some time. If it remains legalized and becomes accepted by the general community, more people would do it, prices would come down, and so would earnings.
(1) Profitability can be defined as anything the supplier receives in return for their product/service which they deem "worth" something. It doesn't have to be money, but could be good feelings, increased social capital, learned knowledge, etc...