On Sat, 06 Apr 2002 17:43:43 -0500, Barbara and/or Bill Hooper <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
>on 4/5/2002 12:02 AM, Pat Naughtin at [EMAIL PROTECTED] wrote: > >> 3 Traders >> These are the folk to attack, and to attack with vigor. Traders deliberately >> (and regularly) use old measures to dupe their customers. > I don't doubt that some of the traders oppose metric becauae they want to >"dupe" their customers, but I really don't think that is true for all the >traders or even all the time for some of the traders (although I am sure it >is true at least some of the time for at least some of the traders). I think >traders fall into one of your other two catagories: they just don't like >change (either fearing what it might bring or just not wanting to be >bothered doing it). That may be their claim, and they may even believe it themselves. However, it's interesting that opposition to metrication (which didn't exist to any perceptible degree prior to 1994) has only occurred since the requirement to sell loose goods by the kg. We have been happily using metric for many other years in other respects. But I believe that the latest changes would have happened overnight if the kilo were smaller than the pound. The real opposition to metric in this case is the fact that they have to show unit prices which appear higher. I'm convinced opposition would have melted away overnight if the metric prices had appeared less. (c.f. the lack of complaints about spending public funds changing US speed limit signs when the national limit was removed, vs. the outcry against changing signs to metric.) Chris -- UK Metric Association: http://www.metric.org.uk/
