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I've always wondered why consumers seem to lack foresight though? Like the foresight of governmental / corporate dystopias due to information asymmetries. or f

I've always wondered why consumers seem to lack foresight though? Like the foresight of governmental / corporate dystopias due to information asymmetries. or foresight that exclusively buying goods manufactured abroad will eventually affect your home price as your neighbors one by one lose their local jobs... Do we know why people act in such a way? Edit: I'm quite shocked at the deep presumption of negativity. I was genuinely trying to discuss and explore the phenomenon of choosing long term detriment for short term gain.

Afforess 4y ago
Your comment reads as incredibly tone-deaf, but I'll give it an honest answer. Hierarchy of needs. Maslow is obviously not accurate, but people focus on basic survival and prioritize themselves and their families first. You do not even reach the level of contemplation of politics until you have food, shelter, comfort and a degree of safety. Most Americans struggle to satisfy all of these consistently. If you want more people to care about privacy, solve their basic needs first. Then they will care about big picture items.
- maerF0x0 4y ago
  fair enough, so your claim is essentially that people likely would, but are struggling to survive in the short run and therefore the long run is basically presumed to not matter?
  - soco 4y ago
    It does matter, but first things first. If you struggle to breathe your first priority won't be finding food, but your entire energy will go into solving the most urgent problem.
    - maerF0x0 4y ago
      Yeah I get that, I guess for me I just see it like . Imagine some town with lots of manufacturing jobs and so many people are shopping at walmart for foreign made wares. How does it not click "If people dont buy local our local made wares, how will our factory stay open?" . I'm not saying so much like right right now, it's obviously too late in many industries to go back any time soon. But like in the 70s-90s, why didn't people working in these industries have the foresight to realize if we dont buy local made wares, there's no need for factory workers here, and if there's no need for factory workers here, there's no need for manager, and if there's no need for managers, the company could just be entirely in the foreign nation. And if if it's in the foreign nation, how are we going to get money to feed ourselves and pay our mortgages (keep the property values at least level) ... It seems like it was more like "Well I could have a TV now, or a TV + Microwave now" and that was the micro decisions that lead to a hollowing out of the labor force. I'm just armchair speculating here, happy to learn more in a concise way (ie doesnt require me to go get a degree on the subject) .
      - pwinnski 4y ago
        Humans almost always and almost everywhere in almost every context make the short-term choice with immediate consequence with very little concern for the long-term effect which is usually much more diffuse. Person A going out to buy a Chinese-made microwave from Walmart today isn't going to lead inexorably to decreased property values, but it is going to give Person A something in which to stick their microwavable popcorn tonight. In fact, many Person As have been buying Chinese-made microwaves from Walmart for many years now, and still property values are going up! Eventually, sure, enough people making those choices on a macro scale leads to factories closing close by, and if there's no corresponding rise in other industries, that will lead to negative economic consequences for the entire area. But that's a far off problem with a lot of uncertainty, and this popcorn isn't going to pop itself tonight! Of course, it is also true that Person A could go out of their way to shop at a local store and buy a microwave made by an American company, but that the American company decides that there's much more profit to be made by moving production overseas, and the negative economic consequences happen anyway. Not because of the short-sightedness of Person A, but the greed and short-sightedness of CEO B. That's even more reason for Person A to not be too worried about their individual purchase.
bejelentkezni 4y ago
That's not foresight, it's out-of-hand speculation. But I guess people who don't wildly speculate would never invest in crypto in the first place, heh.
zichy 4y ago
Having the supposed foresight, I can tell that cryptocurrencies are definitely part of the dystopia.
- maerF0x0 4y ago
  trying to spark a genuine dialogue... > definitely part of the dystopia. How so?
foobarian 4y ago
Maybe people are just like peasants and don't know any better. Maybe someone needs to do the Narodnik thing and go to the people [1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Going_to_the_People https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Going_to_the_People
- gerikson 4y ago
  That was a famous fiasco.
woodruffw 4y ago
There are very few incentives for long term (meaning multigenerational) foresight. Cryptocurrencies embody this: they're either planet-torching (PoW) or encode neofeudalism (PoS) into their consensus schemes.
fl0id 4y ago
There is a diff between people not anticipating possible bad outcomes and acting on it. Since forever, people have complained about bosses, governments etc. still, to a large degree the easiest way wins and some people just need that ‘ease’ to survive their life. The needle of capitalism. And many that do see it as a big problem, disagree on the solution.
newswasboring 4y ago
Tone deafness of your comment aside, this is just like... your opinion man. We don't know this will happen for sure, neither do we know this will not happen. People are not going to spend their time worrying about something that might not happen. There are enough bad things in everyone's life which are certain.
riedel 4y ago
I rather see a dystopian future from unregulated asset flow with no limits and no taxation. Cash for me is a good tradeoff between freedom and necessary control. I would e.g. opt into any equivalent digital currency that does not allow speculation , accumulating or transfer of amount greater than 10k per year or natural person.
sebastianconcpt 4y ago
Normal people is afraid of think and openly discuss things that are too bad to be considered feasible. Hence a compulsion to silence the messenger downvoting your comment in this case. It's very immature (or complicit with what you categorized as dystopian there).

Afforess 4y ago

Your comment reads as incredibly tone-deaf, but I'll give it an honest answer. Hierarchy of needs. Maslow is obviously not accurate, but people focus on basic survival and prioritize themselves and their families first. You do not even reach the level of contemplation of politics until you have food, shelter, comfort and a degree of safety. Most Americans struggle to satisfy all of these consistently. If you want more people to care about privacy, solve their basic needs first. Then they will care about big picture items.

maerF0x0 4y ago
fair enough, so your claim is essentially that people likely would, but are struggling to survive in the short run and therefore the long run is basically presumed to not matter?
- soco 4y ago
  It does matter, but first things first. If you struggle to breathe your first priority won't be finding food, but your entire energy will go into solving the most urgent problem.
  - maerF0x0 4y ago
    Yeah I get that, I guess for me I just see it like . Imagine some town with lots of manufacturing jobs and so many people are shopping at walmart for foreign made wares. How does it not click "If people dont buy local our local made wares, how will our factory stay open?" . I'm not saying so much like right right now, it's obviously too late in many industries to go back any time soon. But like in the 70s-90s, why didn't people working in these industries have the foresight to realize if we dont buy local made wares, there's no need for factory workers here, and if there's no need for factory workers here, there's no need for manager, and if there's no need for managers, the company could just be entirely in the foreign nation. And if if it's in the foreign nation, how are we going to get money to feed ourselves and pay our mortgages (keep the property values at least level) ... It seems like it was more like "Well I could have a TV now, or a TV + Microwave now" and that was the micro decisions that lead to a hollowing out of the labor force. I'm just armchair speculating here, happy to learn more in a concise way (ie doesnt require me to go get a degree on the subject) .
    - pwinnski 4y ago
      Humans almost always and almost everywhere in almost every context make the short-term choice with immediate consequence with very little concern for the long-term effect which is usually much more diffuse. Person A going out to buy a Chinese-made microwave from Walmart today isn't going to lead inexorably to decreased property values, but it is going to give Person A something in which to stick their microwavable popcorn tonight. In fact, many Person As have been buying Chinese-made microwaves from Walmart for many years now, and still property values are going up! Eventually, sure, enough people making those choices on a macro scale leads to factories closing close by, and if there's no corresponding rise in other industries, that will lead to negative economic consequences for the entire area. But that's a far off problem with a lot of uncertainty, and this popcorn isn't going to pop itself tonight! Of course, it is also true that Person A could go out of their way to shop at a local store and buy a microwave made by an American company, but that the American company decides that there's much more profit to be made by moving production overseas, and the negative economic consequences happen anyway. Not because of the short-sightedness of Person A, but the greed and short-sightedness of CEO B. That's even more reason for Person A to not be too worried about their individual purchase.

bejelentkezni 4y ago

That's not foresight, it's out-of-hand speculation. But I guess people who don't wildly speculate would never invest in crypto in the first place, heh.

zichy 4y ago

Having the supposed foresight, I can tell that cryptocurrencies are definitely part of the dystopia.

maerF0x0 4y ago
trying to spark a genuine dialogue... > definitely part of the dystopia. How so?

foobarian 4y ago

Maybe people are just like peasants and don't know any better. Maybe someone needs to do the Narodnik thing and go to the people [1] [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Going_to_the_People https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Going_to_the_People

gerikson 4y ago
That was a famous fiasco.

woodruffw 4y ago

There are very few incentives for long term (meaning multigenerational) foresight. Cryptocurrencies embody this: they're either planet-torching (PoW) or encode neofeudalism (PoS) into their consensus schemes.

fl0id 4y ago

There is a diff between people not anticipating possible bad outcomes and acting on it. Since forever, people have complained about bosses, governments etc. still, to a large degree the easiest way wins and some people just need that ‘ease’ to survive their life. The needle of capitalism. And many that do see it as a big problem, disagree on the solution.

newswasboring 4y ago

Tone deafness of your comment aside, this is just like... your opinion man. We don't know this will happen for sure, neither do we know this will not happen. People are not going to spend their time worrying about something that might not happen. There are enough bad things in everyone's life which are certain.

riedel 4y ago

I rather see a dystopian future from unregulated asset flow with no limits and no taxation. Cash for me is a good tradeoff between freedom and necessary control. I would e.g. opt into any equivalent digital currency that does not allow speculation , accumulating or transfer of amount greater than 10k per year or natural person.

sebastianconcpt 4y ago

Normal people is afraid of think and openly discuss things that are too bad to be considered feasible. Hence a compulsion to silence the messenger downvoting your comment in this case. It's very immature (or complicit with what you categorized as dystopian there).