Perhaps I should have pointed out in my original post at the top about retail pricing structure.
My cost to sale multiplier is 1.42%. This gives me a 30 percent gross margin. Out of this 30% must come all our costs of doing business, and they are many and varied. This will hopefully leave you with a 5 to 10 % net profit that you must now pay persoanl taxes on. You can see from this that it takes a lot of volume to make a living, especially selling low invoice cost items. Often times a business person will find they are not realizing the return on capital that they could get buying CD's, (Certificates of Deposit). Then if they take their after tax net income and reflect that against the hours they put into their buiness, averaging 65 hours a week, they often find they are earning less then the lowest paid laborers on their payroll.
SO...... give the poor businessman a break. He, like you is just trying to make a living. Very few are rich in spite of what you may think.
Best to all
Bebop