Price Boycotts!
by JS
There’s been some coverage in the New York Times of the recent e-book pricing dispute between Amazon and Macmillan focusing on the potential for consumer backlash over e-book prices. The coverage includes the following quote:
“The sense of entitlement of the American consumer is absolutely astonishing,” said Douglas Preston, whose novel “Impact” reached as high as No. 4 on The New York Times’s hardcover fiction best-seller list earlier this month. “It’s the Wal-Mart mentality, which in my view is very unhealthy for our country. It’s this notion of not wanting to pay the real price of something.”
I certainly suspect that in today’s retail culture, basic economic reasoning often gives way to a kind of applied psychology. The prevalence of $x.99 prices, the strategic use of “discounts,” and the variety of tricks and techniques that raise retail bottom lines are certainly proof that this kind of tactical salesmanship does something (which studies seem to support).
But really people, boycotting based on price isn’t exactly a new or serious problem, which is probably best seen if we consider the more common name for this practice — shopping.
