Here's something for you to ponder. After reading it. does anybody believe this?
How many here would pay $10.00 for a $5.65 beer just to say it came from a fine hotel.
"Another experiment shows this by asking subjects to imagine they are lying on a hot beach, craving a cold beer. Would they be willing to pay more, less or the same for their favorite beer if it were purchased from an upscale resort hotel versus from a run-down grocery store?
It turns out that people are willing to pay up to 77 percent more to buy the beer from the fine hotel. A reasonable interpretation is that if you have high prices because you run a nicer business with higher costs, people believe it is fair for you to charge them more than if you have low costs and worse service. An additional inference is that it would seem unfair to force the hotel to lower its prices just because the grocery store charges less."
Arthur C Brooks, April 22,2011. Washington Post
There was no direct response to this so I want to make sure it’s understood.
Arthur C. Brooks has made a career out of trying to make us all believe rich people shouldn’t be expected to contribute more to governing this country. That they are doing more than their share already.
He offers what he calls "Another experiment"as an attempt to make his case. He tells us nothing about where the experiment took place, who conducted it, how many people were involved, their ages, their income levels, their geographic distribution, their politics, their race, the range of responses, or the distribution of responses.
He only tells us that, of however many people who were asked the question, at least one responded with 77% more. This could be one of a thousand or one of twenty or one of two, we don’t know. If it’s one of a thousand, all the other responses could have been 10% or less, or even negative, and still make his statement technically correct but terribly misleading. The question allowed responses of more, less or the same. He doesn’t tell us whether there were any responses of less or the same or how many of each. The average response could have been less than zero but we don’t know. From the information provided, no valid conclusions can be drawn.
He then offers an "interpretation" which is outside the experiment but agrees with his agenda. The subjects weren’t asked why they would pay more and we (including he) have no way of knowing. He then adds an "inference" that is also not supported by his experiment. Negotiating prices was not included to be considered in the experiment.
I think if you and your honey were sitting on a hot beach and behind you, just beyond the sand, there was a Hilton hotel and a somewhat unkempt Casey’s, and you wanted a cold Corona in a bottle, it would be unlikely you would want to pay anything more to get it from the hotel. Such as $2.30 rather that $1.30. Perhaps if the time of delivery was faster, or if one delivered and the other required you to get it, but those conditions were not included in the experiment as described.
Arthur C. Brooks writings should be read with caution. He has an agenda and he creates and distorts evidence to fit it.
