> It is quite puzzling about how you are equating buying & selling on e-bay without ANY misrepresentation (Product is as described & Payment is legimatelty deli

> It is quite puzzling about how you are equating buying & selling on e-bay without ANY misrepresentation (Product is as described & Payment is legimatelty delivered) to a Confidence scam where the author very clearly cheated the stores by misrepresentation/lying. I read the parent as being pretty aware that those are distinct activities and that a confidence scam is solidly across an ethical dividing line most people would agree on -- but also aware that ethics can be seen on a continuum and that there are other dimensions to it beyond whether or not deception is involved. And that taking advantage of ignorance/misunderstanding has something in common with cultivating it. > Is it possible that there is some cultural/educational/somethingelse deep-seated mooring that does not see this as "hard-work" and instead as profiteering? Is it more or less likely that the parent is in such a grip, or that more of us are in the grip of a market-oriented mythos where all profit received is simply profit due from hard work? Which belief is more convenient, and more likely to be compromised by an opportunity to benefit from it?