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Agatha Christie could afford a maid and a nanny but not a car

fullstackeconomics.com

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Re: Agatha Christie could afford a maid and a nanny but not a car

#471

Post by snovv_crash »

dahfizz wrote: post #361
twox2 wrote: post #344

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you look at dollar and time amounts, all financial interactions are pretty much zero-sum.

The transaction itself is not zero sum. The existence of the transaction itself is proof that both parties value what they received more than what they gave away (otherwise they would not have transacted). The waste of time is having to haggle to arrive at the price, when the price could have been published. It benefits nobody, because that's the price the transaction would have happened at anyway. But we have to do…

This of course is under the assumption that time is expensive relative to the accuracy of the market clearing price of the goods being sold. In many cultures this isn't true, people have lots of free time, but each person buying the good might assign different value to it, so by spending a bit more time the people who need the lower price can still access it, whereas the shopkeeper can still make the money to keep the shop running from those who can afford it.

Honestly, thinking that there should be fixed prices for everything, if you're a rich westerner going in, means you're trying to externalize the effort of setting a market clearing rate, and trying to piggy-back off of the locals. If it's at some multinational chain, then sure, don't have people haggle with you over the price of some McNuggets, but at a family owned business, if they can get an additional 20% of the price of the goods they might be doubling their profit margin, so why wouldn't they haggle?

Re: Agatha Christie could afford a maid and a nanny but not a car

#472

Post by danans »

wbobeirne wrote: post #136
danans wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But he found that, since the merchants charged people by their social class, The same thing happens in developed countries like the US too. It's just done a different way: We have high end grocery stores and low end grocery stores, and ones in the middle, each catering more or less to different social classes. If you are really low on the totem pole, you may have no grocery store. Although they differ in the qualit…

I get what you're going for, but this simply isn't comparable. I pretty much can't walk into the same store and purchase the same item but be quoted a different price than anyone else. There are rich areas and poor areas, touristy areas and off-the-beaten-path areas. But in US retail you won't find sellers discriminate based solely on the look of the customer in 99% of cases.

All I said is that class based pricing exists in the US, but it works via physical separation rather than directly based on how the customer looks.

That physical separation is maintained by the actual physical class separation along policed municipal boundaries that exists in the US.

Developing societies instead use walls with barbed wire and hired security for that function.

That said, there are pretty strong correlations between the tier of the grocery store and the appearance of their average customer.

And yes, there are wealthier but frugal people who shop at cheaper stores, but they are an exception.

Re: Agatha Christie could afford a maid and a nanny but not a car

#473

Post by saiya-jin »

throwaway2037 wrote: post #434
saiya-jin wrote: post #225

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same was for Taj Mahal some... 13 years ago. Foreigner price (apart from few neighboring countries) was at least 10-20x the price of local one. Still, well worth seeing that marvel

Zero trolling: If locals pay 1 EUR and you and me paid 10 or 20 EU, is it so bad? I am can accept when the UNESCO world heritage site is top notch. Yes, 20 EUR is expensive, but so is the entrance fee for the Vatican Museum or Le Louvre (Paris). Real Question: Does Italy or France have a programme to allow low income students to enter these world class museums cheaply? It would be great if someone can comment about i…

Of course they have it, whole western (or more probably whole) Europe has significant discount for students and I think elderly too, for any kind of tourist attraction. But not 10 or 20x, more like 20-50% of full ticket.

Re: Agatha Christie could afford a maid and a nanny but not a car

#474

Post by snovv_crash »

emptyfile wrote: post #337
koolba wrote: post #287

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Haggling is fun. I’m convinced the modern aversion to haggling in first world countries is because people grow up avoiding all direct confrontation. They think it’s somehow how rude to disagree with someone about the price of the article at hand. The next level of it is when they justify this “politeness” by claiming that haggling is inefficient or a waste of time.

100% agree with you, and I don't want anything resembling confrontation when I'm buying souvenirs on vacation. Couldn't care less if its rude or polite or whatever. Go ahead and haggle if its fun for you.

Just pay the initial asking price then?

Re: Agatha Christie could afford a maid and a nanny but not a car

#475

Post by boring_twenties »

bhelkey wrote: post #461
boring_twenties wrote: post #418

Earlier quoted context omitted.

To know if he's rich or not we would need to know his net worth, not his income (or how nice his stuff is).

I disagree. In an extreme example, Tim Cook made ~$100 Million in 2021 [1]. Regardless of his net worth, I would consider him rich. [1] https://news.yahoo.com/apple-tim-cook-compensation-other-tec... .

Your example only works because it's so extreme, it's enough income for a dozen people to become rich instantly, even if they all start from 0.

By contrast, a house in a "super nice" neighborhood along with multiple private school tuitions can easily eat up the entirety of the $250k/yr income, leaving that guy actually broke in the end.

Re: Agatha Christie could afford a maid and a nanny but not a car

#476

Post by hogrider »

asdff wrote: post #138
paxys wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Heck 330 USD is also probably on the higher end. In India (which is considered the "expensive" country in South Asia) it is pretty easy to find full time household help for $200/mo even in large, expensive cities. Stuff like iPhones and imported cars, however, cost double their price in the states.

Seems there is a huge business opportunity just mailing things like Apple products from Oregon, where you don't pay sales tax, straight to india to be sold far below their market rates for that same product.

That's called contraband. Protectionist tariffs are there to deter exactly this.

Re: Agatha Christie could afford a maid and a nanny but not a car

#477

Post by AussieWog93 »

alisonatwork wrote: post #312
AussieWog93 wrote: post #244

Interesting that he brings up "a robot to automatically brew Starbucks-caliber coffee". Here in Australia, you can get a really high-quality coffee from just about any petrol station for $1 (in AUD; around 70c in USD). Yet in spite of this, we have a thriving cafe scene where people will gladly pay $4-$5 for a take-away latte. What's equally "irrational" is that Starbucks, despite the high amount of effort put into e…

I remember when Starbucks first arrived in Australia there were several articles talking about exactly this topic. Because cheap espresso coffee is ubiquitous in Australia, Starbucks doesn't provide the same value-add that it did in the US where most coffee was weak drip coffee to begin with. I think it took years of careful marketing till Starbucks was able to "train" Australians to pay double for their mixed drinks…

I just looked up a couple of articles myself. Apparently they entered the market in 2000, expanded rapidly but closed a whole lot of stores in 2008. As of 2022 they're still yet to turn a profit.

I don't think it's a case of them requiring years of marketing to convince the general Australian public to pay more (you go past the store at Melbourne Central and it's 50-50 Asian tourists and hipster Zoomers with Macbooks that want to pretend they're in New York; either way, they just view the brand as some quirky novelty), nor is it the competition from cheap espresso (7-11 didn't launch their dollar coffees until 2013, and Coles Express was maybe a year after that) - it's the fact we already had an established coffee culture and Starbucks' product fundamentally fails to conform to what our idea of a "real" coffee is.

They could sell their drinks for $1 at 7-11 and people would still buy the standard lattes.

Re: Agatha Christie could afford a maid and a nanny but not a car

#478

Post by hnlmorg »

zo1 wrote: post #421
hnlmorg wrote: post #399

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not going to comment whether it's more or less likely than in other cultures. My point wasn't to start a race war, I was just commenting that we have a history on such topics (eg https://www.ukessays.com/essays/history/rape-in-american-sla... )

But mentioning it as if white people are known for it or did it lots or have a specific history of it is quite racist. Bad things are committed by all races and slavery is certainly one of them. It's whitewashing the world's dirty secrets and then pinning them on the evil white man.

As I've said elsewhere, the context was already about white men employing people from black communities -- go re-read the GP's post, I wasn't the one that bought race into it. I just made an uncomfortable truth that some people apparently feel the need to defend by proxy with the usual arguments of "other people were just as bad", as if that somehow reconciles the atrocities that we committed (hint: it doesn't).

Honestly the "other cultures are just as bad" argument here strikes me just as poor as the "all lives matter" protest comment against the BLM movement:

> There is a difference between something being true and something being relevant.

source: eg https://relevantmagazine.com/current/the-problem-with-saying...

Re: Agatha Christie could afford a maid and a nanny but not a car

#479

Post by CSMastermind »

throwaway2037 wrote: post #448
CSMastermind wrote: post #385

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Ironically, we still paid less out of pocket for that week-long hospital stay without insurance than we would have paid for a single day hospital stay here in the US with insurance. I'm curious about this one. I've been to the hospital one time in my adult life. Stayed overnight, got multiple tests including an Xray and an MRI. Got medication, etc. Having heard the horror stories I was ready for a big bill. It was…

I am confused by this seriously down-voted post. Are you based in the US visiting a local hospital saying that you received (very!) fair pricing for an MRI and X-ray? If not, can you please explain?

I am, I'm a US citizen and my one major interaction with the US healthcare system seemed like I received great treatment for a completely fair price.

Re: Agatha Christie could afford a maid and a nanny but not a car

#480

Post by tristor »

bregma wrote: post #464
tristor wrote: post #425

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> good idea to have an emergency stash of the currency of dishonesty when travelling abroad I recommend that you do some research about the economics of any country you visit. As you've already somewhat discovered, many places in Central America and South America will actually prefer payment in US dollars because the official government exchange rates from their local currency to dollars is extortionately unfair and…

> I don't know why you consider dollars to be the "currency of dishonesty" I was not trying to imply Americans are dishonest. I was trying to imply that insisting on the use of foreign currency like USD as the sole medium of exchange, or any other black market activity if it comes to that, is a dishonest way to make a living. And sure, I understand why the black market exists from a socioeconomic point of view. I hav…

> I witnessed stuff in Peru that would make suburban Karen's head explode with apoplexy, and it was just considered normal and expected stuff there.

Agreed on that wholeheartedly. Visiting Peru was an interesting experience for me as well, and one that was deeply sad in many ways. There's such a visibily stark wealth inequality in Lima that's immediately obvious as soon as you deplane that is usually hidden away in other parts of the world. Lima is an amazing world-class food city, but most of that is found within Miraflores district which is a far cry from the conditions of most of the rest of the city or in the pueblo jovenes on the outskirts of town in the hills. The same is found in other parts of Peru as well, and in a way I am very happy for it because it made obvious to me things I had been able to avoid or put out of my mind in my travels elsewhere and made me more aware of how different societies exploit people and the role of the West in creating and enabling those conditions, my own role as a traveler included.

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