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Maryland becomes first state to ban surveillance pricing in grocery stores

theguardian.com

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Re: Maryland becomes first state to ban surveillance pricing in grocery stores

#201

Post by vmilner »

antonvs wrote: post #197
ryandrake wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Doesn't that depend on the state? I'm almost sure there are quite a few states that allow stores to charge a higher price at checkout than what the product is labeled with on the shelf.

That’s fraud, plain and simple. There are already laws against that. No more specific laws are needed. Fraud: “a deliberate act of deception, misrepresentation, or concealment of material facts intended to gain an unauthorized benefit—typically money or property—while causing loss to another party.”

Isn't it common for state sales taxes to be added at the till? (I don't live in the US but that seemed to be what happened on my visits there)

Re: Maryland becomes first state to ban surveillance pricing in grocery stores

#202

Post by vmilner »

magicalhippo wrote: post #196
crazygringo wrote: post #44

Sadly, this article doesn't explain how this "surveillance pricing" (which is just a scarier-sounding synonym for "dynamic pricing") would even work in a physical grocery store. Like, prices are displayed on the shelf for everyone to see. And they have to match what you pay at checkout. So how the heck would a grocery store even do this? And this law is specifically around grocery stores . Like, there was a big kerfu…

Based on the headline I thought it was what grocery chains here in Norway do, where they have people hired to "shop" at a competitor while simultaneously noting prices on items. If they see the competitor has lowered the price of milk, they'll lower it to match. Apparently they can do such adjustments multiple times a day back and forth. Been some talk about banning that here.

"Pricematch" is also common in the UK for traditional stores like Sainsburys Tesco competing with Lidl and Aldi 'discounters'.

Re: Maryland becomes first state to ban surveillance pricing in grocery stores

#203

Post by imtringued »

svachalek wrote: post #76
crazygringo wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I still don't understand how that would work. Yes, e-ink is great for updating prices, I welcome it at grocery stores. But if both me and another person are standing in front of the prosciutto and cured meats fridge, we're seeing the same prices, even if I'm poor and they're rich.

I think they're conflating/confusing a bunch of different things here. E-ink tags let stores run sales more often, offer "happy hour" time of day discounts, etc. It's not so much individualized (other than probably some demographic targeting, like raising prices 5-6 pm when well employed people are picking stuff up on the way home). The personalized pricing is usually by having everyone pay through an app. The app kn…

The economy requires companies to be mind readers to function optimally [0], which is impossible, so they choose the less invasive option of harvesting all your data.

[0] One of the core foundations of neoclassical economics is unbounded rationality which includes the ability to predict the future.

Re: Maryland becomes first state to ban surveillance pricing in grocery stores

#204

Post by xethos »

crazygringo wrote: post #44

Sadly, this article doesn't explain how this "surveillance pricing" (which is just a scarier-sounding synonym for "dynamic pricing") would even work in a physical grocery store. Like, prices are displayed on the shelf for everyone to see. And they have to match what you pay at checkout. So how the heck would a grocery store even do this? And this law is specifically around grocery stores . Like, there was a big kerfu…

Everyone seems to be discussing physical, in-person shopping. Multiple stores near me do "Click'n'collect", where one picks out items online and just drives to the store to collect them (for example) on the way home from work

Surveillance pricing something like that, pretty much entirely online? I think we can all imagine how to set that up without too much trouble

Re: Maryland becomes first state to ban surveillance pricing in grocery stores

#205

Post by antonvs »

vmilner wrote: post #201
antonvs wrote: post #197

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s fraud, plain and simple. There are already laws against that. No more specific laws are needed. Fraud: “a deliberate act of deception, misrepresentation, or concealment of material facts intended to gain an unauthorized benefit—typically money or property—while causing loss to another party.”

Isn't it common for state sales taxes to be added at the till? (I don't live in the US but that seemed to be what happened on my visits there)

Sales tax is a government imposed requirement that's not included in prices in the US, so there's no misrepresentation and no fraud. If that's what the commenter above was talking about, they're confused about what's being discussed.

Re: Maryland becomes first state to ban surveillance pricing in grocery stores

#206

Post by kotaKat »

svachalek wrote: post #76
crazygringo wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I still don't understand how that would work. Yes, e-ink is great for updating prices, I welcome it at grocery stores. But if both me and another person are standing in front of the prosciutto and cured meats fridge, we're seeing the same prices, even if I'm poor and they're rich.

I think they're conflating/confusing a bunch of different things here. E-ink tags let stores run sales more often, offer "happy hour" time of day discounts, etc. It's not so much individualized (other than probably some demographic targeting, like raising prices 5-6 pm when well employed people are picking stuff up on the way home). The personalized pricing is usually by having everyone pay through an app. The app kn…

The UFCW's defense is that e-ink price tags "take away skilled work". I have no clue what intense high-ELO skill is required to stick a sticker onto a shelf, but I'm sure they can figure out how to stick an E-ink tag up instead and how to replace some batteries.

Re: Maryland becomes first state to ban surveillance pricing in grocery stores

#207

Post by [deleted] »

lokar wrote: post #108
crazygringo wrote: post #44

Sadly, this article doesn't explain how this "surveillance pricing" (which is just a scarier-sounding synonym for "dynamic pricing") would even work in a physical grocery store. Like, prices are displayed on the shelf for everyone to see. And they have to match what you pay at checkout. So how the heck would a grocery store even do this? And this law is specifically around grocery stores . Like, there was a big kerfu…

For individual discrimination (vs neighborhood or time of day), one way would be what Macdonalds does: - raise all the prices - have an app (with an account) to give personalized discounts - use “AI” (or, just a regular program) to pick the optimal set of discounts per person, squeezing as much as you can out of them

[deleted]

Re: Maryland becomes first state to ban surveillance pricing in grocery stores

#208

Post by slumberlust »

rhettsnaps wrote: post #200
free_bip wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're already watched by security cameras, it's not hard to do facial recognition anymore. And you have companies literally lining up to sell such facial recognition databases. It's conceivable they could determine what price you pay for groceries while your car is on the way to the store, thanks to Flock.

Disney Parks patented tracking via shoes and groups of people/families based on scanning their shoes upon park entry to build an index of guests. Not sure how and where it was all applied during park visits for guests but you're definitely correct that facial recognition upon store entry to kickoff a live dynamic profiling of a customer is what's currently being beta tested/deployed by some retailers.

Why would they need to do that when you are already wearing an RFID bracelet?

Re: Maryland becomes first state to ban surveillance pricing in grocery stores

#210

Post by tt24 »

Ritewut wrote: post #209
tt24 wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A completely made up thing?

I used to live in a food desert. Glad to know I imagined it and lived in fantasyland.

I’m sure they exist in places like Kingman. Doesn’t mean we need to structure our pricing policy around 0.001% of people
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