6 ms·

The USA needs a big reform on when it comes to what is displayed as a price to lure in people. What's the meaning of having a price advertised only to be met wi

The USA needs a big reform on when it comes to what is displayed as a price to lure in people. What's the meaning of having a price advertised only to be met with + taxes and fees. I can calculate the taxes in my head but the fees are so arbitrary. What's stopping a shop advertising a car at 10% below MSRP and slapping on a dealer showroom MSRP? We shouldn't allow fees for things they are mandatory. Like the resort fee. Or the online purchase fee. And the tips at the end. Always begging and begging.

InCityDreams 3y ago
Started in Europe too. I tried an online shop dealing in a very particular hobby of mine...got the end - 5 10 15% tip buttons. I sent them a message: no more custom from me until the buttons go. I gave them the link to an alternative source i found. Still no reply.
- esperent 3y ago
  If they're using a pre-built sales system, which they almost certainly are, the buttons come with the system. There should be an option to turn them off but there might not be. And for sure, as a seller it's tempting to leave them there.
arielcostas 3y ago
Yeah, I can't understand how Americans can live that way, having to calculate the tax in their head, or adding the fees for everything and all. In Europe I go to a supermarket, and if something has a 1€ price tag, I only need a 1€ coin. Every price includes VAT,unless the seller is B2B, since companies don't pay VAT. And in those cases, prices must indicate N€+VAT. And the tips, that stupid model of calculating the percentage and stuff is new, copied from the US. At least in Spain it's common not to tip, or at most round to the next euro and "keep the change"
- esperent 3y ago
  > Every price includes VAT As a seller this absolutely sucks. Not saying it's a bad thing. It's not. But imagine you're a small business, and you price the croissants you've just spent hours making at €1 each and you know you'll only get €0.79 of that. It feels unfair. Especially since you'll end up paying even more tax after that too. So I guess you could say the US method favors the seller, while the (mostly) rest of the world method favors the buyer.
  - drbaba 3y ago
    > But imagine you're a small business, and you price the croissants you've just spent hours making at €1 each and you know you'll only get €0.79 of that. It feels unfair. Then price the croissant at €1.25 instead? The US method would still make the customer pay that amount; the only difference is whether the math is done once by the seller or every 10min by a new customer.
    - sneak 3y ago
      I bet there is a difference in revenue, too. Customers are not rational. Lower advertised numbers (even if the out of pocket cost is the same) will likely result in more customers and sales.
      - drbaba 3y ago
        If one business excludes tax from the price while every other business includes it, that’s misleading advertisement. I think writing the full price to be paid by the customer should be mandated by law, in which case no business gets a relative advantage over any other. Where I live, we go even further: if you offer a subscription with a binding period, you also have to write the minimum total amount to be paid by the customer before they can cancel the subscription. This helps prevent customers into getting tricked into spending more money than they can really afford, which is a good thing?
  - imtringued 3y ago
    It is a tax on trade. It hurts both the seller and the buyer. Changing the label does absolutely nothing.
- reddit_refugee3 3y ago
  We live that way because we have no choice, and the majority of people here are still comfortable enough to not even realize that we're constantly getting screwed over in nearly every way.
perryizgr8 3y ago
Makes sense to keep the taxes separate. Citizens should know how much money is not going to the provider of their product/service, but to the gang with a monopoly on violence. You will find that in more authoritarian nations it is mandated to show the final price including taxes.
- ElDji 3y ago
  Make sense to keep separated to please every american libertarian tourist that travel around the world, as long as the actual total is showing.
- stuaxo 3y ago
  I'm too tired to read this - so when I pay for something and the receipt has the amount and another bit showing the tax then this is because I live in a more authoritarian state. The more authoritarian state isn't the one where police not only carry guns but shoot citizens with them on a daily basis ? Instead it's the one where you only see the vat seperate out on your receipt, OK.
- martin8412 3y ago
  Stores have to show the price including any and all applicable fees/taxes/etc, and when you've completed the transaction, those fees/taxes/etc are all itemised on your receipt...
  - rhaway84773 3y ago
    The GP is such a great example of the tyrannical use of “FREEDOM” to brainwash people in America to the point they don’t even realize they’re being brainwashed. The GP is convinced that being lied to on a daily basis and by every commercial entity they interact with is FREEDOM. Even though, as you point out, one can get the same FREEDOM without being lied to. But FREEDOM means whatever they have been told all their life is true and that they shouldn’t think for themselves at all.
- WeylandYutani 3y ago
  Countries provide an annual budget each year down to the last cent which is posted on a public website. There's no secret.
WeylandYutani 3y ago
I have no problem with asking for a tip. But in the US it's not really a question. They already put the tip on the bill! People get paid a salary for their job. Seriously if that's not enough to survive just raise the wages by 15% and move on from tipping culture. But I heavily suspect that it's because of tax evasion.
- Tanoc 3y ago
  People working in industries that get tips such as food services, delivery, hair dressing, and the like don't get salaries. Either they get paid hourly or commission. And because of that they aren't guaranteed a stable wage. Pushing for tips can be the way they cover for a shortfall in income when their employer shuffles their schedule towards less hours or a customer cancels an appointment. As for raising wages... We've been trying to do that since 1993. There was a push in the '90s that wanted an increase from the $5 mark for federal minimum wage. There was an even larger movement called "Fifteen By Fifteen" which was designed around pushing the minimum wage up to $15 an hour by 2015 instead of the $7.25 it's been since 2009. Outside of the minimum wage, most hourly jobs in the U.S. have had their actual wages stagnate since 2011 when adjusted for inflation, if they've not outright decreased. Warehouse handling labour for example still only pays about $15 an hour national average, which when adjusted is actually less than it was in 2012 when it was $12 an hour. Working full time in that job without overtime ($15 an hour, 40 hour work weeks, 51 weeks a year) that's about $30,000 a year. For reference the average new car price nationwide is $48,000 a year (median $43,000), the average rent price for a two bedroom apartment is $1,900 a month as of May (median $1,600), and the average price of a house is $436,000 (median is the same although sources range from $420,000 to $480,000). Non-specialist workers are kind of screwed over here in the States. EDIT: Accidentally put rent as yearly instead of monthly.
  - abduhl 3y ago
    Why are you referencing the AVERAGE prices of things when discussing the MINIMUM wage?
    - Tanoc 3y ago
nunez 3y ago
> What's stopping a shop advertising a car at 10% below MSRP and slapping on a dealer showroom MSRP? Nothing. That's exactly what happens, especially once you get sent into the Finance Office.

InCityDreams 3y ago

Started in Europe too. I tried an online shop dealing in a very particular hobby of mine...got the end - 5 10 15% tip buttons. I sent them a message: no more custom from me until the buttons go. I gave them the link to an alternative source i found. Still no reply.

esperent 3y ago
If they're using a pre-built sales system, which they almost certainly are, the buttons come with the system. There should be an option to turn them off but there might not be. And for sure, as a seller it's tempting to leave them there.

arielcostas 3y ago

Yeah, I can't understand how Americans can live that way, having to calculate the tax in their head, or adding the fees for everything and all. In Europe I go to a supermarket, and if something has a 1€ price tag, I only need a 1€ coin. Every price includes VAT,unless the seller is B2B, since companies don't pay VAT. And in those cases, prices must indicate N€+VAT. And the tips, that stupid model of calculating the percentage and stuff is new, copied from the US. At least in Spain it's common not to tip, or at most round to the next euro and "keep the change"

esperent 3y ago
> Every price includes VAT As a seller this absolutely sucks. Not saying it's a bad thing. It's not. But imagine you're a small business, and you price the croissants you've just spent hours making at €1 each and you know you'll only get €0.79 of that. It feels unfair. Especially since you'll end up paying even more tax after that too. So I guess you could say the US method favors the seller, while the (mostly) rest of the world method favors the buyer.
- drbaba 3y ago
  > But imagine you're a small business, and you price the croissants you've just spent hours making at €1 each and you know you'll only get €0.79 of that. It feels unfair. Then price the croissant at €1.25 instead? The US method would still make the customer pay that amount; the only difference is whether the math is done once by the seller or every 10min by a new customer.
  - sneak 3y ago
    I bet there is a difference in revenue, too. Customers are not rational. Lower advertised numbers (even if the out of pocket cost is the same) will likely result in more customers and sales.
    - drbaba 3y ago
      If one business excludes tax from the price while every other business includes it, that’s misleading advertisement. I think writing the full price to be paid by the customer should be mandated by law, in which case no business gets a relative advantage over any other. Where I live, we go even further: if you offer a subscription with a binding period, you also have to write the minimum total amount to be paid by the customer before they can cancel the subscription. This helps prevent customers into getting tricked into spending more money than they can really afford, which is a good thing?
- imtringued 3y ago
  It is a tax on trade. It hurts both the seller and the buyer. Changing the label does absolutely nothing.
reddit_refugee3 3y ago
We live that way because we have no choice, and the majority of people here are still comfortable enough to not even realize that we're constantly getting screwed over in nearly every way.

perryizgr8 3y ago

Makes sense to keep the taxes separate. Citizens should know how much money is not going to the provider of their product/service, but to the gang with a monopoly on violence. You will find that in more authoritarian nations it is mandated to show the final price including taxes.

ElDji 3y ago
Make sense to keep separated to please every american libertarian tourist that travel around the world, as long as the actual total is showing.
stuaxo 3y ago
I'm too tired to read this - so when I pay for something and the receipt has the amount and another bit showing the tax then this is because I live in a more authoritarian state. The more authoritarian state isn't the one where police not only carry guns but shoot citizens with them on a daily basis ? Instead it's the one where you only see the vat seperate out on your receipt, OK.
martin8412 3y ago
Stores have to show the price including any and all applicable fees/taxes/etc, and when you've completed the transaction, those fees/taxes/etc are all itemised on your receipt...
- rhaway84773 3y ago
  The GP is such a great example of the tyrannical use of “FREEDOM” to brainwash people in America to the point they don’t even realize they’re being brainwashed. The GP is convinced that being lied to on a daily basis and by every commercial entity they interact with is FREEDOM. Even though, as you point out, one can get the same FREEDOM without being lied to. But FREEDOM means whatever they have been told all their life is true and that they shouldn’t think for themselves at all.
WeylandYutani 3y ago
Countries provide an annual budget each year down to the last cent which is posted on a public website. There's no secret.

WeylandYutani 3y ago

I have no problem with asking for a tip. But in the US it's not really a question. They already put the tip on the bill! People get paid a salary for their job. Seriously if that's not enough to survive just raise the wages by 15% and move on from tipping culture. But I heavily suspect that it's because of tax evasion.

Tanoc 3y ago
People working in industries that get tips such as food services, delivery, hair dressing, and the like don't get salaries. Either they get paid hourly or commission. And because of that they aren't guaranteed a stable wage. Pushing for tips can be the way they cover for a shortfall in income when their employer shuffles their schedule towards less hours or a customer cancels an appointment. As for raising wages... We've been trying to do that since 1993. There was a push in the '90s that wanted an increase from the $5 mark for federal minimum wage. There was an even larger movement called "Fifteen By Fifteen" which was designed around pushing the minimum wage up to $15 an hour by 2015 instead of the $7.25 it's been since 2009. Outside of the minimum wage, most hourly jobs in the U.S. have had their actual wages stagnate since 2011 when adjusted for inflation, if they've not outright decreased. Warehouse handling labour for example still only pays about $15 an hour national average, which when adjusted is actually less than it was in 2012 when it was $12 an hour. Working full time in that job without overtime ($15 an hour, 40 hour work weeks, 51 weeks a year) that's about $30,000 a year. For reference the average new car price nationwide is $48,000 a year (median $43,000), the average rent price for a two bedroom apartment is $1,900 a month as of May (median $1,600), and the average price of a house is $436,000 (median is the same although sources range from $420,000 to $480,000). Non-specialist workers are kind of screwed over here in the States. EDIT: Accidentally put rent as yearly instead of monthly.
- abduhl 3y ago
  Why are you referencing the AVERAGE prices of things when discussing the MINIMUM wage?
  - Tanoc 3y ago

nunez 3y ago

> What's stopping a shop advertising a car at 10% below MSRP and slapping on a dealer showroom MSRP? Nothing. That's exactly what happens, especially once you get sent into the Finance Office.