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Why nobody ever wins the car at the mall

thehustle.co

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Re: Why nobody ever wins the car at the mall

#461

Post by acct1771 »

VectorLock wrote: post #322
braythwayt wrote: post #242

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Way back in the day, I had a reinsurance company as a client. For those unfamiliar, reinsurance companies insure insurance companies. For example, they might insure a standard insurance company for automobile accidents, with a $1,000,000 deductible. So the retail insurance company handles payouts up to a million dollars, but when there's a really wild claim, the reinsurance company pays the insurance company for anyt…

Wow I'd love to hear some of those stories. What a largely unknown, esoteric and hugely interesting industry.

You just described the finance industry as well.

You can save yourself a lot of adjectives by saying "dirty".

Re: Why nobody ever wins the car at the mall

#462

Post by ZainRiz »

s17n wrote: post #458
lotsofpulp wrote: post #372

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Considering Marriott/Hilton/IHG requires their hotels to use a 10 year warrantied mattress that only costs $250-$300 each, I'd say even $800 is too high. Even though that's wholesale price, doubling should be enough to get a single unit price. People would be better off investing in some HIIT cardio excercise if they're looking for a good night's sleep. And eating less / more nutritious food.

The extra $300 is what you pay for going with a reputable brand, because unlike Marriott, you don't have the time to figure out which off-brand mattresses are crap and which aren't.

Book a room at the Marriott, go in, rip the sheets off the bed, check the manufacturer on the mattress tag, go buy your mattress from them.

(And enjoy the rest of your night in the hotel)

Re: Why nobody ever wins the car at the mall

#463

Post by lotsofpulp »

s17n wrote: post #458
lotsofpulp wrote: post #372

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Considering Marriott/Hilton/IHG requires their hotels to use a 10 year warrantied mattress that only costs $250-$300 each, I'd say even $800 is too high. Even though that's wholesale price, doubling should be enough to get a single unit price. People would be better off investing in some HIIT cardio excercise if they're looking for a good night's sleep. And eating less / more nutritious food.

The extra $300 is what you pay for going with a reputable brand, because unlike Marriott, you don't have the time to figure out which off-brand mattresses are crap and which aren't.

They're not off brand, they're Temper-Sealy or Simmons.

Re: Why nobody ever wins the car at the mall

#464

Post by rootusrootus »

mrbill wrote: post #429
namibj wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have any arguments to convince an employer to buy Cherry MX Brown (style) keyboards, instead of <15$ flimsy, flat membrane ones?

I usually brought my own keyboards (you can get one with MX browns or mx brown clones for $35-75 on amazon) to whatever job.. but at this one they saw my keyboard, said "Budget of $100, spec out whatever you want, and we'll order it." The guy said "$150 for a keyboard and mouse of someone's choice, amortized over a year or two, is a tiny price to pay to keep our people happy." I ended up with a Das 4C board at work (…

That's the type of company I prefer to work for. Given how much they are spending on salary, quibbling over a decent quality keyboard & mouse raises red flags.

Re: Why nobody ever wins the car at the mall

#466

Post by jonhendry18 »

aekotra wrote: post #436
jonhendry18 wrote: post #74

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The solution is probably a two-part form where the winner can fill in their SSN and seal it in an envelope, then the contest operator would take that envelope and enclose it with the operator's part of the form, and mail it. That way the contest operator need not ever see the winner's SSN. The amusing thing is the apparent widespread assumption that contest operators are shady as f.

What the...the problem is the contest winner not trusting the operator with their information. How does giving the operator an envelope containing their SIN solve this problem?!

Okay I didn't think that through.

Re: Why nobody ever wins the car at the mall

#467

Post by JackCh »

Bjartr wrote: post #401
JackCh wrote: post #370

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Has there ever actually been a confirmed case of a nuclear warhead being sold by an arms dealer?

What would constitute confirmation for you?

Has the BBC ever reported on it happening, as more than just a potential?

Re: Why nobody ever wins the car at the mall

#468

Post by artificial »

rrauenza wrote: post #318
technofiend wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a furniture salesman here in Houston who makes heavy use of that sort of promotion. His latest if you spend $3,000 on a mattress and the Astros win the "2018 baseball final championship series" you'll be refunded the purchase price. Not sure why it's worded so formally; must be a legal thing.

I'm trying to recall the Mancini Mattress (Bay Area) ad -- something like "If we can't beat the price, the mattress is free!" I'm thinking ... ohhh... I bet they always somehow manage to beat the price!

Yes, the way they do that is having specific mattresses that are only produced for them. So for example, let's call it Dreamliner XL 2000, this mattress isn't manufactured by anyone else, even if there are Dreamliners sold by other vendors it isn't that model, hence the bold claim. Whee!

Re: Why nobody ever wins the car at the mall

#469

Post by s17n »

lotsofpulp wrote: post #463
s17n wrote: post #458

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The extra $300 is what you pay for going with a reputable brand, because unlike Marriott, you don't have the time to figure out which off-brand mattresses are crap and which aren't.

They're not off brand, they're Temper-Sealy or Simmons.

In that case, your assertion that "doubling should be sufficient to get single unit price" was wrong, cause you aren't going to get a queen from either of those companies for $500.

Re: Why nobody ever wins the car at the mall

#470

Post by ben509 »

Dylan16807 wrote: post #441
ben509 wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're paying income tax, not sales tax, because winnings are income. (Think about professional gamblers...) Income taxes are progressive, of course, and then there are a mess of deductions. But they could still make an estimate by just assuming the person is in the $37K to $92K bracket. So that's 25% [1]. > It seems like bad publicity if your "winners" have to pay several thousand in sales tax to get their "prize ca…

> You're paying income tax, not sales tax, because winnings are income. (Think about professional gamblers...) Think about them why? Gambling income is in a completely different category from a prize you won for free. There's no reason they have to be taxed the same.

> Gambling income is in a completely different category from a prize you won for free.

The only difference is that as a professional, you're filing your taxes as a business. It's still "income"[1], it's just the entity filing is a business rather than a specific person.

Regardless, a prize you win is not taxed as a sale.

> There's no reason they have to be taxed the same.

To the extent they're treated inconsistently, people will use the discrepancy to game the system. Politicians do that deliberately, of course, since it's an opportunity for graft.

[1]: https://www.investopedia.com/terms/i/income.asp

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