In his 1945 article "The Use of Knowledge in Society," Hayek uses the example of the tin market to illustrate the mechanics of the international price system. In one of the hypotheticals he uses, he says that "it is very significant that it does not matter which of these two causes has made tin more scarce," the two causes being either 1) "a new opportunity for the use of tin has arisen," or 2) "one of the sources of supply of tin has been eliminated." What was Hayek's reasoning as to why it doesn't really matter which change has occurred in the tin market?

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