RE: drink prices
Prof. Bryan Caplan Writes: [...] > Joel Simon Grus wrote: > > > (1) Where else do people buy things without knowing the price first? > > (I've been thinking and have been unable to come up with any examples.) > > Hotel phone calls. Before single-price nationwide long distance became popular, people used to buy all long distance calls this way. In theory, you could call the operator for a rate quote, but most of the time people just placed their calls. Some anecdotal reports: I've visited a number of web stores where the shipping charges were added on after you authorized payment with a credit card. (Yes, I got burned on one of these.) I think people often tell their auto mechanic to just fix the problem without quoting a price. I usually tell mine to call me only if the price will exceed a few hundred dollars. (I don't have the time to price-shop for repairs to the car I use to get to work.) I can't ever remember my doctor and I discussing prices before he runs a test or does a procedure. On the other hand, my dentist always told me the cost of anything unusual, and sometime offered several approachs. Mark Draughn -- [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Re: drink prices
Actually, I've dealt with this situation and it's quite different than the drink at a bar. When you hire a (decent) carpenter, they will tell you what additional labor cost, should it be required. A reputable contractor will have this written out before hand, and you will have signed an agreement saying you know extra work might be reuqired @ $X per hour. Contracts are used to control uncertainty. However, when you order a drink/make a hotel call, there is often no menu, or its hidden. People seem to operate with a price range in mind that is acceptable to them. Fabio > There are also many situations where the price can change, and alter prior > price agreements. Suppose you hire a carpenter to fix a stairway. He quotes > you a price. But halfway thru the job, the carpenter discovers rotten pieces > that were not previously known, that have to be replaced, and the price > increases. You have already contracted and paid some of the expenses; most > folks will just go along with reasonable price changes. So often, in such > cases, we really don't know the final price. > > Fred Foldvary
Re: drink prices
> > (1) Where else do people buy things without knowing the price first? > Hotel phone calls. > Also, in restaurants people often order drinks before they see the menu. > Prof. Bryan Caplan There are also many situations where the price can change, and alter prior price agreements. Suppose you hire a carpenter to fix a stairway. He quotes you a price. But halfway thru the job, the carpenter discovers rotten pieces that were not previously known, that have to be replaced, and the price increases. You have already contracted and paid some of the expenses; most folks will just go along with reasonable price changes. So often, in such cases, we really don't know the final price. Fred Foldvary = [EMAIL PROTECTED] __ Do You Yahoo!? Great stuff seeking new owners in Yahoo! Auctions! http://auctions.yahoo.com
Re: Spam: Legal, economic or technical problem?
Since when is AOL free?
RE: monopoly justice vs free market justice
Francois-Rene Rideau wrote: "This is a gratuitous statement, and unless you begin arguing it, hopefully with economic arguments (since this is Armchair Economists). I'll assume that you utter it out of the same blind religious superstition as the other people I've seen defend democracy.": Uh no, it's not economically based or will it be... this discussion left Economics when it began to address "public policy" choices, not simply monetary policy, benefit maximization, or even questions about drink prices, but began to substitute economic "rationality" as the basis for a discussion of societal issues in general. -Original Message- From: Francois-Rene Rideau [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Sunday, February 03, 2002 8:17 PM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: monopoly justice vs free market justice [About private justice vs State justice] On Wed, Jan 30, 2002 at 08:20:06AM -0500, Pinczewski-Lee, Joe (LRC) wrote: > We all can see societies operate on the above > principles, the Yanomami in the Amazon, various tribes in Papua-New Guinea, > Lebanon circa 1975-1990, the Balkans, and Somalia 1992 to present. I don't know enough about the Yanomami and Guinean tribes, but I fail to see how you can account the Lebanese and Somalian problems to a private justice system, when there has precisely been political wars raging - wars for the political control on other people's lives - wars to kill as enemies people of different ethnic or religious obedience. > The line "and taking back 'too much' might raise an endless vendetta war. > Hence everyone's interest in finding a peaceful agreement." is OBVIOUSLY > untrue. In all these societies VENDETTA and war are the result of one > side taking "private" justice. As if governments had eliminated vendetta wars! Mind you, they took vendetta wars to a whole new size. Letting aside WWI and WWII, just consider the recent Afghanistan event. A terrorist attack, itself explainable only because of resentment against the US government, has served as the pretense for a full-fledged war. The same usual illusion of States pretending to eliminate externalities, yet only concentrating them into a huge externality of ensuring there be a good government happens with States pretending to eliminate injustice, yet only concentrating injustice into its own huge administration. > Plus, the line "Both parties, as well as surrounding > families, are interested in peace, and will thus seek a prompt agreement > before court." is also obviously untrue The parties and their families > ARE NOT INTERESTED IN PEACE, they are interested in survival, familial > obligations, and power, hence WAR is often the preferable outcome rather > than a court. As if war could bring durable survival and power! As economists, we know that freely agreed win-win exchanges of services is a much better strategy than the win-lose situation of plunder, or the lose-lose situation of war, be it only because the latter are so hazardous. The more commerce is developed, the less people have interest in war. If you want to continue doing trade with civilized people, you'll have to abide by all the court rulings that will raise a consensus on the need to enforce them. > Anarcho-Capitalism is flawed in that it assumes a degree of > rationality and benefit maximization that humans do not truly exhibit. The fatal conceit not just of socialism, but of any kind of statism, is to believe that governments somehow magically have more rationality and benefit maximization (of an altruistic kind, moreover) than citizens. The Public Choice theory showed how untrue this could be. Libertarians never ever claimed that citizens are magically rational and benefit-maximizing - they claim that government are no more such than them, and that things are better for citizens, whatever their objectives, when they are free to choose, with the feedback loop of responsibility directly guiding them into taking good decisions. Anarcho-Capitalists apply this line of reasoning to security and the justice system as well as all other goods and services people can expect to get from the society and the world. You might disagree, but don't claim Anarcho-Capitalism assumes what it doesn't assume - it only discredits you. > A monopoly justice system, tied to democracy is superior > to either "private justice" or system of justice > based on authoritarian principles. This is a gratuitous statement, and unless you begin arguing it, hopefully with economic arguments (since this is Armchair Economists). I'll assume that you utter it out of the same blind religious superstition as the other people I've seen defend democracy. [ François-René ÐVB Rideau | Reflection&Cybernethics | http://fare.tunes.org ] [ TUNES project for a Free Reflective Computing System | http://tunes.org ] Science is like sex: sometimes something useful comes out, but that is not the reason we are doing it -- Richard Feynman
Time to repeal the Nobel Prize for Economics?
Reasoning: Just when we needed economists to be keen about how progressive measurements can lead the way to our knowledge age, they seem to have no appetite. The Economist Catch 22: let's rubbish the New Economy rather than the old measures and greeds which ruined the first wave of experiments of it. Fair or unfair comment... chris macrae, [EMAIL PROTECTED] ref discussion board at www.normanmacrae.com
RE: drink prices
Why do people not reject decisions, which with hindsight are unfavourable? The "drink order paradox" seems to be similar to the subject of following paper: "Illusion of Expertise in Portfolio Decisions: An Experimental Approach" GERLINDE FELLNER, WERNER GUETH, BORIS MACIEJOVSKY ABSTRACT: Overall, 72 subjects invest their endowment in four risky assets. Each combination of assets yields the same expected return and variance of returns. Illusion of expertise prevails when one prefers nevertheless the self-selected portfolio. After being randomly assigned to groups of four, subjects are asked to elect their "expert" based on responses to a prior decision task. Using the random price mechanism reveals that 64% of the subjects prefer their own portfolio over the average group portfolio or the expert's portfolio. Illusion of expertise is shown to be stable individually, over alternatives, and for both eliciting methods, willingness to pay and to accept. Keywords: Investment Decisions, Portfolio Selection, Overconfidence, Unrealistic Optimism, Illusion of Control, Endowment Effect http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=296121 Steffen -Original Message- From: Bryan D Caplan [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] Sent: Monday, February 04, 2002 4:55 AM To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] Subject: Re: drink prices Joel Simon Grus wrote: > (1) Where else do people buy things without knowing the price first? > (I've been thinking and have been unable to come up with any examples.) Hotel phone calls. Also, in restaurants people often order drinks before they see the menu. -- Prof. Bryan Caplan Department of Economics George Mason University http://www.bcaplan.com [EMAIL PROTECTED] "Who are they? Why are they running? Could they be coming to me? Really coming to me? And why? To kill me? *Me* whom everyone loves?" Leo Tolstoy, *War and Peace*
