Thread

1. flowerlad · 1790184294 · focus · HN ↗

   Why is this limited to groceries? I don't want to pay a different price than others for any category of item, not just groceries.

   Should gyms be able to charge me more based on my weight? Should airlines charge me more because they know I need to travel urgently? Should pharmacies charge me more for medication because they know I have a chronic condition? Should an online retailer charge me more because my browsing history suggests I'm willing to pay a premium? Should insurance companies charge me more because they know I'm unlikely to shop around?

   1. [deleted] · 1790184492 · focus · HN ↗

      [deleted]

   2. BeetleB · 1790185101 · focus · HN ↗

      If I'm selling to the wealthiest zip code, where the median house price is over $10M, should I be disallowed to charge higher prices? (Not for selling a house, but selling ordinary stuff to them).

      If I'm posting something for sale on Craigslist, and I don't put a price, is it OK if I quote different prices to different people who text me?

      I can see arguments both ways.

      1. colingauvin · 1790185274 · focus · HN ↗

         Not comparable. The markets can still charge wherever they want, but it needs to be priced per item and not per customer. In your house counterexample, you could set whatever list price you want.

         1. BeetleB · 1790186745 · focus · HN ↗

            I updated my comment - it wasn't clear. I wasn't referring to the price of houses, but to the price of goods sold to people living in that zip code.
      2. ericmay · 1790185585 · focus · HN ↗

         > If I'm selling to the wealthiest zip code, where the median house price is over $10M, should I be disallowed to charge higher prices?

         I think so, because perhaps your costs to distribute those products is more too. But what I don't think you should be able to do is say, well your house was $50mm and your house was $1mm so you pay much more. Or you're wearing Air Force Ones so maybe your price is just a little more wink wink. It's a bit like hyper-targeted advertising versus general advertising.

         > If I'm posting something for sale on Craigslist, and I don't put a price, is it OK if I quote different prices to different people who text me?

         I think so as well. I don't see a problem with this - you don't know anything (maybe besides a green/blue text) anything about the buyer, how much they make, &c.

         1. BeetleB · 1790187750 · focus · HN ↗

            > I think so as well. I don't see a problem with this - you don't know anything (maybe besides a green/blue text) anything about the buyer, how much they make, &c.

            Going with the Craigslist scenario, what if I do? What if I quote different prices depending on the area code of their phone number? So I quote higher prices for people with a California number?

            I'm not asking about morality or ethics. Does it make sense to make this scenario (Craigslist ad) illegal?

            1. ericmay · 1790188198 · focus · HN ↗

               Idk it seems like it's just different to me and we don't need to create a blanket rule that encompasses Craigslist. Why not just start with stores for example?
            2. jbombadil · 1790189070 · focus · HN ↗

               I take issue with this type of argument, because it ignores that scale is the _core_ part of the problem.

               Equating "an individual selling on craigslist prices based on area code" with "Albertsons buys petabytes of individual private data and prices groceries based on income" is IMO not valid. Yes the very very core -borderline philosophical- question is the same. But the _scale_ is what makes it the problem.

               It's the same argument I heard a few times "Why is flock a problem? My home driveway camera points at the street and sometimes I can read a license plate!"

               So much like other laws / ordinances / provisions / etc. if regulation against this type of behaviors get enshrined, they should include thresholds for scale (which I believe the Seattle one does)

               1. hahn-kev · 1790269964 · focus · HN ↗

                  Yeah that was my thought too. This behavior is fine for a person, not for a company. I'm tired of companies being people.
            3. Arainach · 1790195689 · focus · HN ↗

               Yes.

               Substitute your logic: is it OK to change your price because the responder is from an area that is mostly black? No, it's not.

               Charge one price and charge it for everyone. Anything else leads to discrimination and other awful behaviors that we've had to pass laws to change.

               1. BeetleB · 1790200000 · focus · HN ↗

                  > is it OK to change your price because the responder is from an area that is mostly black? No, it's not.

                  That's only because that's enshrined in law. Discriminating based on wealth or geography is not. Nor is discriminating based on political party affiliation.

                  > Anything else leads to discrimination and other awful behaviors that we've had to pass laws to change.

                  Only in the most egregious of cases.

                  Keep in mind that discounts for seniors, veterans, medical workers, etc are all discriminatory. You're giving a different price between two groups. It's really the equivalent of listing the price as $100, and then charging $110 if you're not in one of those groups.

                  1. Arainach · 1790200886 · focus · HN ↗

                     > Only in the most egregious of cases.

                     Everything is egregious. Private equity is buying up everything, and the only things it doesn't control are what big data got to first. Everything is owned by soulless amoral demons who never sleep.

                     Employers are mining data to find the exact minimum salary each candidate will accept.

                     Airlines are working to charge every customer the maximum they can stomach.

                     Landlords are using companies to fix prices while claiming they're not fixing prices.

                     Grocery stores want in on it. Healthcare wants in on it. Everything is doing what you claim the "most egregious cases" are.

                  2. Arainach · 1790214073 · focus · HN ↗

                     > That's only because that's enshrined in law

                     Things are not wrong because they're illegal, they are wrong because they are wrong.

                     Something being legal does not make it moral.

            4. fwip · 1790204770 · focus · HN ↗

               > I'm not asking about morality or ethics. Does it make sense to make this scenario (Craigslist ad) illegal?

               Why shouldn't we consider morality or ethics in what we decide is illegal?

         2. rozal · 1790198074 · focus · HN ↗

            [dead]

      3. like_any_other · 1790189577 · focus · HN ↗

         > If I'm selling to the wealthiest zip code, where the median house price is over $10M, should I be disallowed to charge higher prices?

         Yes, you should be disallowed. Otherwise every online store will upcharge you based on IP. There can be exceptions for small businesses or individuals, but that's it.

      4. kwyjibo1230 · 1790200361 · focus · HN ↗

         If you take charging higher grocery prices for richer people to its furthest point, you could end up with a system where every item costs Y% of their assets and the utility of a dollar is reduced the more you have. In effect, this would eliminate the relative value of having more money. For example, eggs could be priced at 0.02% of total assets, which means a poorer person with $2000 pays 40 cents, and a richer person with $1M pays $200.

         Now, would this go to its furthest point? Probably not, but it has the same, but smaller, effect of reducing the utility of money for richer people.

         In some scenarios, this actually might make sense. For example, in Finland, they use the day fine system where traffic ticket fines are based on the violator's daily disposable income. It's useful because this is a scenario where you want the punishment to feel equivalent to all income levels.

         For groceries, I don't think this should apply, because I think we would not want the act of purchasing food to equally punish all levels of wealth.

         This really becomes a philosophical discussion of defining price gouging and immoral market techniques. Some are clearly gouging, such as charging 2x plane fares for someone who has to fly to a funeral, or tripling the price of supplies after a natural disaster. Some are less clear.

         1. tancop · 1790231741 · focus · HN ↗

            That system would still have fixed prices that are the same for everyone, just in relative terms instead of absolute. It's the same as a "normal" economy with perfectly equal wealth. It would also break down if people can give each other money but that's a different problem.

            The problem is surveillance pricing uses a different percentage for each person to maximally exploit them. When the store thinks a person is hungry it will charge them 1% instead of 0.02 in your scale free economy, or $20 instead of 0.40 in our world. That's not fair no matter how you put it, and it's only possible in a big corp dominated market with no real competition.

      5. malwrar · 1790201933 · focus · HN ↗

         How can price discovery work if everyone’s price is different? What downward pressure would even exist on surveillance-derived prices besides resale black markets? Societally, do we really want to further monetize the expansion of the mass surveillance state?
   3. micromacrofoot · 1790185311 · focus · HN ↗

      you already do pay a price difference for many categories of items, insurance is a big one... where you live, how old you are, gender, etc

      it used to be the norm with health insurance until the ACA dropped discrimination for chronic conditions

      airlines charge more if you're too large to fit your seat

      online retailers very often charge people more, there are hundreds of factors now... but one funny case was mac users getting redirected to more expensive hotels by travel sites

      car insurers will raise premiums for people who haven't switched recently, I had to switch every 6 months for a couple years until one of them just stopped hiking prices around renewal

      dynamic pricing is very very prevalent, but doing it on food (like health insurance before it) is particularly egregious

      1. ericmay · 1790185693 · focus · HN ↗

         > airlines charge more if you're too large to fit your seat

         I don't think this is a good example, because you're literally using more of the product that's being sold. I get where you're coming from but this one doesn't seem to really reinforce the point you are trying to make. It's like selling by weight or something if you wanted to compare it to groceries.

         1. micromacrofoot · 1790186756 · focus · HN ↗

            well there are valid and invalid examples, I don't think you could have a blanket rule that covers everything

            with the airline seat example some could argue that they have health reasons beyond their control and it's not their fault that airline seats are so small (they really are smaller than ever)

            another example are stories of electricians charging more to people who want EV chargers installed because they already paid a premium to buy the EV, contractors will often bump up their prices if a house looks nicer, etc... these sort of biases have been rampant everywhere for a long time

            1. ericmay · 1790188321 · focus · HN ↗

               > another example are stories of electricians charging more to people who want EV chargers installed because they already paid a premium to buy the EV, contractors will often bump up their prices if a house looks nicer, etc... these sort of biases have been rampant everywhere for a long time

               I think this is a more concerning problem and it's tough to tackle but I'd also say don't let perfect be the enemy of good. We can do some things to start with which I think would capture a lot of the downsides of these pricing models.

            2. tzs · 1790192300 · focus · HN ↗

               > another example are stories of electricians charging more to people who want EV chargers installed because they already paid a premium to buy the EV.

               I've heard people work around this by getting a plug-in charger instead of hardwired. They get a 14-50 plug put in saying it is for a welder for their home workshop or for an electric range or an RV hookup for when their parents visit or something like that. A clothes dryer outlet works too, but usually won't support as many amps.

               All those, except the clothes dryer, still do give some indication you probably are reasonably well off or have well off parents at least, so might invite some gouging.

      2. flowerlad · 1790185765 · focus · HN ↗

         There is charging more because your costs are higher (most of your examples), then there is charging more because of opportunism. Insurance is customized because the costs are higher. That's fine.

         Taking advantage of your personal circumstances that is unrelated to cost to charge you more--especially when it is hidden from you--is what is bad and should be illegal.

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