> Without those laws, the price going from $1 per mask to $10 per mask would still be very much affordable for everyone who really needs a mask, and factories who can successfully get decent production underway will earn lots

Friend owns a textile factory in India. They immediately began production of masks, which they sold at something like a 10,000% premium. (Re-tooling is expensive, so their profits weren’t exorbitant. Though they were larger than normal, which incentivises the work.) Once the premium diminished, they went back to making clothes.

India has anti-gouging laws. But they are loosely enforced to the point of non-existence. In America, we not only have such laws, we also have a media circus and cancel subculture that strongly discourages such responses.