Time to stop being a consumer...

[Axulus]

Isn't freedom great? What do you suggest? Outlawing freedom, which allows for both good behavior and bad behavior? The core of all your objections is ultimately "freedom sucks, because some people will use that freedom in ways that I object to."

There is nothing wrong with freedom; There is nothing wrong with food either, but I won't eat 20 hamburgers at a sitting; And warmth is nice, but I don't want to be heated to 3,000^oC.

All things in moderation. If you think freedom is an exception, you will need to do more than just assert it to persuade me.

Your freedom to swing your arm ends at my nose. Your freedom to lie about your product ends when someone is defrauded.

We weren't talking about lying but using persuasion and emotional appeal. Lying in a business transaction is fraud and punishable with both civil and criminal penalties.

 

[bilby]

There is nothing wrong with freedom; There is nothing wrong with food either, but I won't eat 20 hamburgers at a sitting; And warmth is nice, but I don't want to be heated to 3,000^oC.

All things in moderation. If you think freedom is an exception, you will need to do more than just assert it to persuade me.

Your freedom to swing your arm ends at my nose. Your freedom to lie about your product ends when someone is defrauded.

We weren't talking about lying but using persuasion and emotional appeal. Lying in a business transaction is fraud and punishable with both civil and criminal penalties.

Except when it is considered 'normal' and completely ignored; that is why psychics and astrologers are allowed to remain in business, despite peddling nothing but lies.

Car salesmen sell a mixture of real products (cars) and lies (you will be more attractive to women if you own this vehicle). It is 'traditional' and 'normal' to the point where most people don't even notice it; but it is not harmless, nor is it a simple exercise of their freedom.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Sometimes it informs.

Years ago I ran into an ad. I had never heard of the product but when I saw it it was an Aha!, that's the answer. I promptly ordered some.

Yes, but did you really need to buy this product, or were you manipulated into a purchase of something which served no purpose in your life?

They're useful.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

The idea of no haggle is an idea of only a few countries in the world. For people in most countries. haggling is a way of life and they would laugh at anyone foolish enough to pay the initial asking price (of course they would only laugh after you paid and left).

Which has very little to do with "no haggle" car dealerships. The reason why they don't want haggling is because nowadays buyers can easily google what the dealer paid for the car and what's the real value. If I owned a dealership, I'd want nothing more than to see this type of "haggling" go away and set a fixed price so my salespeople don't have to waste hours and hours in haggling to get the same price anyway.

The antiquated idea of some middle eastern Bazaar where you haggle for hours for price of a goat is utterly anachronistic in age of internet where it's possible to line up and compare hundreds if not thousands of buyers and sellers side by side, sometimes even automatically.

Yeah, it's time for a change. There are still enough suckers out there, though, that it's not going to happen yet.

There's also some problems with the data--we bought a car last year and paid a hair under what the dealer supposedly paid.

 

[bilby]

Which has very little to do with "no haggle" car dealerships. The reason why they don't want haggling is because nowadays buyers can easily google what the dealer paid for the car and what's the real value. If I owned a dealership, I'd want nothing more than to see this type of "haggling" go away and set a fixed price so my salespeople don't have to waste hours and hours in haggling to get the same price anyway.

The antiquated idea of some middle eastern Bazaar where you haggle for hours for price of a goat is utterly anachronistic in age of internet where it's possible to line up and compare hundreds if not thousands of buyers and sellers side by side, sometimes even automatically.

Yeah, it's time for a change. There are still enough suckers out there, though, that it's not going to happen yet.

There's also some problems with the data--we bought a car last year and paid a hair under what the dealer supposedly paid.

'Sucker' is a word meaning 'person who has imperfect knowledge and can therefore be robbed'. Why this state is so denigrated, when advertisers and salesmen work so hard to engender it, is instructive to consider.

The existence of the 'sucker' is well known in business; people enjoy taking advantage of them. In the same way, people enjoy taking money from inadequately secured premises. It is usually not illegal to take a 'sucker' for all you can bilk out of him; after all, it's seen as 'his own fault'; in exactly the same way that a car thief reckons that it is his victim's own fault for not getting a car alarm, or not parking in a well lit area.

That someone is naive, misinformed, or even stupid, is no excuse for robbing him. When the misinformation takes the form of advertising, you can even create your own 'suckers', rather than having to wait for one to come along naturally. Why this supposedly makes defrauding him OK is beyond me.

Nobody thinks that he is a sucker; (at least, not until he gets rolled). Even then, he likely won't admit (even to himself) that he is that most reviled of idiots, the 'sucker'. He rationalises, he makes excuses for himself, he persuades himself, if at all possible, that really he got a good deal. Of course, if you are able to convince yourself that you are too much of a genius to be rolled, then you must refuse to admit or accept that advertising has any effect on you; leading to the widespread belief that corporations are spending vast sums of money on advertising that has zero effect. This is ridiculous, but it isn't 'in your face'; the cognative dissonance is assuaged by saying "I am not swayed by advertising", and by not thinking too hard about the fact that over $500 billion per annum is spent on it.

Why, if we are all such genii, are corporations throwing away half a trillion dollars a year?

 

[Derec]

"wrong with preferring one kind of car over another"? That could be debated. But just let's not pretend that the car manufacturers advertisers and dealers have any interest in whether this car is going to fit your actual needs and desires best, and that they are not working together to sell as many of these as possible regardless of whether there is an inherent and pre-existing "demand" as was posited earlier.

Why should car companies and dealerships do your homework for you? Buying a car is a major purchase and people have a responsibility to treat it with the importance it deserves.

 

[Derec]

Woah. Amoral?

Yes, amoral.

There is no actual hand,

That's what I was saying. Hence "metaphorical".

just advertising which can be explicitly immoral.

Any individual thing can be "immoral". So what?

I'm sorry, did you say "strict"? Because I didn't see an example of "strict" above. Perhaps overreaching in a case or two, but certainly not "strict".

What would you see as "strict" advertising standards? In the context of a generally free society of course, so don't bring Iran or China as examples.

 

[Derec]

The advertising is little but emotional imagery and appeals to emotional desires.

You know, fulfilling our emotional desires is not necessarily irrational. I think ignoring them would be.

Every year for some unknown reason the style must change.

Wrong. Car companies restyle cars every few years, not every year. Redesigning your car would be prohibitively expensive and pointless anyway.

It is not enough to make functional improvements to an already aesthetically pleasing design.

What's wrong with making both functional and aesthetic changes? Aesthetic trends change.
The BMW 3 Series for example is in its 6th generation over 40 years. Hardly "every year".
Should the 3 Series still look the same as it did when it was introduced in 1975?

Here's the modern version:

Note that some car models change less over the years (e.g. Porsche 911) while some change a lot (e.g. Ford Mustang) but usually when a company replaces a model with a fundamentally different one they rename it as well (Ford Escort to Focus in the late 90s).

Then when you go to buy the car for some reason the price is not fixed. What you pay depends on external knowledge and negotiating skills.

There are also dealerships that use fixed price model, like CarMax. Saturn used to do it too, but they are defunct.
In general you will find more variability with used car prices because the dealer has more to play with where it's real easy to compare between dealerships.
In any case, it is the responsibility of the customer to get themselves informed before coming to the lot.

The new car market is not a rational market.

Much more so than used car market for sure.

 

[Derec]

I remember browsing in an antique dealer's booth, many years ago. He had two very similar cabinets for sale. One was in much poorer shape than the other, but priced $45 more. I asked about this and he said, "I've got more in that one." This means it cost him more than the other. It also meant he either didn't care whether he sold poor one, or he just wasn't a very good businessman.

Labor theory of value in practice.

 

[Derec]

It doesn't show the rationality of needing a different style of the same thing every year,

No car manufacturer I know of does that. They change styling for each generation, which is usually 5 or 6 years.
In fact, some carmakers get criticized for not changing the styling enough.

or the difference in the price paid for the same car at the same dealership.

You mean negotiating the price? Yes, that seems an American peculiarity, but particularly with new cars it's easy to compare prices online.

It says nothing about the irrationality in the advertising.

Can you give us examples of what especially irks you with car advertising?

 

[Derec]

I disagree. Advertising does not inform. It manipulates and persuades.

It depends on the ad. But often especially TV commercials seek to put the product in front of the consumer such that they will notice, as most ignore commercials as a matter of course. Hence reliance on humor and interesting or stunning visuals. But I would not call it manipulative, not even persuasive, it's merely awareness-building.

But I am definitely saying that they ARE trying to get people to buy things they don't need and they ARE trying to fool people into buying things. When they crank up volume for TV commercials, make false and misleading claims and attempt to target vulnerable markets, they are very deliberate and carefully orchestrated efforts.

They are by law not allowed to make false claims.

 

[Derec]

Nothing wrong with it, but the desire for beautiful objects can leave the buyer open to exploitation by marketeers,

So can desire for any kind of object. But if I am going to spend tens of thousands of dollars on a new car, it better appeal to me visually as well (and that goes for interior as well). It is simply another aspect of the product that manufacturers compete on. There are many mid-size sedans or small SUVs or sport cars around, all competing for customers.

businesses designing, manufacturing and offering ever more desirable objects for profit rather than actual need:

Businesses are in the business of making profit. If they couldn't make profit they would not have a reason to make whatever they are making in the first place.

a new model every year or so. Get rid of the old and buy the fancy new model and you'll be the envy of your peers; designed obsolescence and appealing to the psychological power of desire....

If you can afford a new car every few years (at that point leasing might be a better option though) and this is what you want to spend your money on go for it. Others might spend the same kind of dough on a bigger or more desirable house or country club membership or travel or building that wine collection. To afford any of those things they will not spend nearly as much on others. Different things are important to different people and businesses will form to cater to those wants as well.
There is nothing wrong with fulfilling wants that go beyond basic needs after all.

 

[Derec]

The billboard did not convince me to eat Mexican food that I otherwise wouldn't. It informed me that there was competition in town.

Let's say you instead moved from a place where Mexican food wasn't popular. This billboard would have convinced you to try Mexican food that you otherwise wouldn't. Still a good thing though.

 

[DBT]

I disagree. Advertising does not inform. It manipulates and persuades.
I'm not saying this is right or wrong, nor suggesting that they have no right to try.

Sometimes it informs.

Years ago I ran into an ad. I had never heard of the product but when I saw it it was an Aha!, that's the answer. I promptly ordered some.

Sometimes it informs. But the aim of advertizing is to sell.

 

[DBT]

So can desire for any kind of object. But if I am going to spend tens of thousands of dollars on a new car, it better appeal to me visually as well (and that goes for interior as well). It is simply another aspect of the product that manufacturers compete on. There are many mid-size sedans or small SUVs or sport cars around, all competing for customers.

businesses designing, manufacturing and offering ever more desirable objects for profit rather than actual need:

Businesses are in the business of making profit. If they couldn't make profit they would not have a reason to make whatever they are making in the first place.

a new model every year or so. Get rid of the old and buy the fancy new model and you'll be the envy of your peers; designed obsolescence and appealing to the psychological power of desire....

If you can afford a new car every few years (at that point leasing might be a better option though) and this is what you want to spend your money on go for it. Others might spend the same kind of dough on a bigger or more desirable house or country club membership or travel or building that wine collection. To afford any of those things they will not spend nearly as much on others. Different things are important to different people and businesses will form to cater to those wants as well.
There is nothing wrong with fulfilling wants that go beyond basic needs after all.

That's fair enough to a point. But in practice, the drive for profit and generating sales though marketing ever more attractive models goes beyond the practicalities of nicely designed products that are built to last and into the realm designed obsolescence and waste of natural resources. Which, given the ever growing numbers of consumers within finite system, cannot be sustainable in the long term.

 

[untermensche]

Sometimes it informs. But the aim of advertizing is to sell.

It is an attempt to manipulate.

An attempt to cause subconscious irrational factors to dominate in decision making.

One thing it is not is an appeal to reason.

 

[ksen]

You know what's especially informative in advertising?

Sex.

Nothing tells me more about a product than a sexy body draped all over it.

Also, I didn't know there were so few Mad Men watchers itt.

 

[untermensche]

You know what's especially informative in advertising?

Sex.

Nothing tells me more about a product than a sexy body draped all over it.

Also, I didn't know there were so few Mad Men watchers itt.

It's toasted.

 

[DBT]

Sometimes it informs. But the aim of advertizing is to sell.

It is an attempt to manipulate.

An attempt to cause subconscious irrational factors to dominate in decision making.

One thing it is not is an appeal to reason.

That's right, in order to sell your product, hopefully to create a captive market, you must manipulate prospective buyers by stimulating their desire for your product through the use of appealing imagery and catchy tunes and saturation advertizing to pound the message into their heads.

 

[untermensche]

It is an attempt to manipulate.

An attempt to cause subconscious irrational factors to dominate in decision making.

One thing it is not is an appeal to reason.

That's right, in order to sell your product, hopefully to create a captive market, you must manipulate prospective buyers by stimulating their desire for your product through the use of appealing imagery and catchy tunes and saturation advertizing to pound the message into their heads.

Some will be far more susceptible to emotional appeals than others.

Instead of making a superior product, manipulating many who are most easily manipulated is enough.

It undermines markets.