4 ms·

You two just identified a market opportunity

vkou 1y ago
What market opportunity? If the allegedly poor quality of service isn't enough to drive customers away, why would the customers give a fig about its ownership structure? The customer cares about the taxi, not the checkers.
- throwaway48476 1y ago
  The problem is the poor service is delivered before the bad pricing. Stifles the corrective market competition pressure.
  - vkou 1y ago
    That theory is correct for people whom you get the choice to interact with once or twice with in your life, like realtors and funeral home directors or picking your thesis advisor, but really falls apart for anyone who has a regular customer base of people who come back for repeat service. If my dentist starts charging me double and starts treating me like shit, I really couldn't care less about the practice's ownership structure, or how clean and well-structured, and unit-tested the code that runs on his computer is, If I have a choice, I'll look somewhere else. If I don't have a choice, I'll bitch, but keep going to him. At no point will I care whether or not the office is PE-owned. It's utterly irrelevant to me.
    - throwaway48476 1y ago
      A lot of Americans pay for dental services through insurance which adds another layer of complexity. The insurance provider negotiates and then just passes through the cost, of course this leads to higher prices than market competition provides. Dental services need to publish price lists, this will allow for price discovery and market competition.
      - vkou 1y ago
        For any non-trivial work, dentists will happily look around in your mouth, and then give you an itemized quote for how much treatment will cost, before they schedule treatment for you. They aren't doctors, they know how much two pills of ibuprofen cost. You absolutely can comparison shop (Even if the dentist in question doesn't exactly know what % of the bill your insurer will reimburse, and the best they can do for that is to give a rough estimate.) It's probably not worth it for routine work if you're insured, and absolutely worth it for anything serious, or if you don't have insurance.
        throwaway48476 1y ago
        One of the best things trump did was forcing hospitals to publish their price lists. Dentists should be regulated and publish their prices too. Allow for comparison shopping.
    - DangitBobby 1y ago
      No, it works for the vet too. I have suspected for a long time that they are fucking us on prices but it's difficult to compare them. I always pay after services rendered.
throwaway48476 1y ago
Regulation and mandatory disclosure is required.

vkou 1y ago

What market opportunity? If the allegedly poor quality of service isn't enough to drive customers away, why would the customers give a fig about its ownership structure? The customer cares about the taxi, not the checkers.

throwaway48476 1y ago
The problem is the poor service is delivered before the bad pricing. Stifles the corrective market competition pressure.
- vkou 1y ago
  That theory is correct for people whom you get the choice to interact with once or twice with in your life, like realtors and funeral home directors or picking your thesis advisor, but really falls apart for anyone who has a regular customer base of people who come back for repeat service. If my dentist starts charging me double and starts treating me like shit, I really couldn't care less about the practice's ownership structure, or how clean and well-structured, and unit-tested the code that runs on his computer is, If I have a choice, I'll look somewhere else. If I don't have a choice, I'll bitch, but keep going to him. At no point will I care whether or not the office is PE-owned. It's utterly irrelevant to me.
  - throwaway48476 1y ago
    A lot of Americans pay for dental services through insurance which adds another layer of complexity. The insurance provider negotiates and then just passes through the cost, of course this leads to higher prices than market competition provides. Dental services need to publish price lists, this will allow for price discovery and market competition.
    - vkou 1y ago
      For any non-trivial work, dentists will happily look around in your mouth, and then give you an itemized quote for how much treatment will cost, before they schedule treatment for you. They aren't doctors, they know how much two pills of ibuprofen cost. You absolutely can comparison shop (Even if the dentist in question doesn't exactly know what % of the bill your insurer will reimburse, and the best they can do for that is to give a rough estimate.) It's probably not worth it for routine work if you're insured, and absolutely worth it for anything serious, or if you don't have insurance.
      - throwaway48476 1y ago
        One of the best things trump did was forcing hospitals to publish their price lists. Dentists should be regulated and publish their prices too. Allow for comparison shopping.
  - DangitBobby 1y ago
    No, it works for the vet too. I have suspected for a long time that they are fucking us on prices but it's difficult to compare them. I always pay after services rendered.

throwaway48476 1y ago

Regulation and mandatory disclosure is required.