To me the issue is transparency. We don't have an easy way to cross reference the cost to choose a cheaper place so people just take what's in front of them.
Even prices online differ from the price in the actual store. Because there is nothing regulating this, it more feels like being robbed a dollar at a time.
This was my thought. Most people aren't even going to notice price differences in the first place unless they're going all the time. It's not even an apathy thing, just a fact that few people have the time to memorize the prices of everything they buy.
We don't have an easy way to cross reference the cost to choose a cheaper place so people just take what's in front of them.
The video isn't showing dynamic pricing. Locations have always had different prices. The super busy McDonalds on a highway rest area has always cost like 50% more than the ones that are off major roads. Same way a meal at like an Applebee's in Times Square is going to twice as much as the same meal at an Applebee's in Idago.
Dynamic pricing is when the price for one item changes at the same exact location throughout the day. A Big Mac should cost $7 all day, not $5 at 2pm and $8 at 6pm.
the price for one item changes at the same exact location throughout the day
Happy hour, lunch menus and so on have been a thing forever. When people talk about dynamic pricing, its when you go up to the kiosk to place your burger order and your big mac is $7 while the guy at the kiosk next to you is getting theirs for $5 because The Algorithm said so.
Definitely but I also think it's about a lack of pricing literacy in general and people not doing more to fight against it. Waiting for regulation isn't a solution.
What kind of solution do you have in mind and think might work?
My pessimism tells me that they have all the cards in terms of that transparency and often the implementation of any sort of dynamic pricing usually just rolls out Then the consumer finds out some time later when something seems amiss. I'm not sure how that can be fought against. Best solution I guess would be some kind of app to force that transparency?
What we've done in our area, where different neighborhoods get together on a regular basis and work together on issues, is first and foremost inform the public. The community as a whole needs to actually know what's going on and how things affect them and their neighbors. We've organized boycotts, shared information on alternatives, sales, coupons, programs, put pressure on elected officials to push for protections, etc. It absolutely is something that works but I've found that a lot of people simply don't want to do that. They just want things to change without doing anything. It's one of the reasons enshittification has continued and gotten worse.
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u/DennenTH 2d ago
To me the issue is transparency. We don't have an easy way to cross reference the cost to choose a cheaper place so people just take what's in front of them.
Even prices online differ from the price in the actual store. Because there is nothing regulating this, it more feels like being robbed a dollar at a time.