[ExI] Eliot Spitzer and the Price-Placebo Effect

[Lee Corbin]

BillK writes  (hey, okay if I call you "Bill" from now on, or
do you prefer it this way?)

> Lee wrote:
> <snip>
>>  Now isn't that going a bit far?  For centuries and centuries, marketers
>>  have known that price means a whole lot, but that packaging, salesmanship,
>>  and other subtle effects also exist.  Example...
>>
>>  "Based on our systematic, unsurprising irrationality"?  Surely a vast,
>>  vast overstatement.
> 
> That's the book working!

Not sure what that means, but don't answer if it's being
explained by your next words:

> You wouldn't buy a book that said that *occasionally* people make
> mistakes when buying stuff, would you?

Well, my book group might very well do that.  But they are quite
the refined, careful, studious, skeptical, hideously rational gang.
I might buy such a book---but I do understand if you are saying
that blurbs have to exaggerate.  Perhaps you should have mentioned
that you too found the claims a bit of an exaggeration, and avoided
my complaining   :-)

>  :) Everybody knows that. But he is making a stronger claim
> than that, with experimental evidence to back it up.

Based on your reputation here, Bill, I entirely believe you.

>>  Makes sense.  Greater understanding is good---and there can
>>  always be higher profit as well as higher customer satisfaction
>>  obtaining as a result too.
> 
> Yes, That politician was paying well over the odds for sexual
> services, but thought he was buying something really special, so
> probably felt he got his money's worth.
> 
> Just like a 60,000 USD car is not twice as good as a 30,000 USD car.
> Probably better, in some respects, if you like the extra trimmings,
> but definitely not twice as good.

Well, BUT!  But the rich types are known to behave as though
money were not a factor. Again, I hate to be spouting what 
"everyone knows", but for some few things, money is not a
factor even for me.  I paid almost a hundred dollars the other
day for an old, old, thin out-of-print SF book (The Horror 
>From the Hills) whose language totally captivated me (and
whose language even today I find hilarious).  I lent to to a
friend back when I was 22 and that was the last I ever saw
of it.  Later, I couldn't even remember the name.  Finally when
our ever growing web finally yielded to my search on phrases,
I *had* to have it.

> One experiment showed that even if you didn't want any of the extra
> features, buyers still preferred it, because they thought they were
> getting more for their money. Even if they didn't want the extra junk!

Yeah, that's believable.  Though I'd like a study done that indicated
what proportion of the populace was really susceptible to this, or
I dunno, a histogram or something....   The people I know watch 
their dollars very carefully.

> Reading the reviews and extracts provide more amusing examples.

I'll check out the reviews at Amazon.  Any other place I should look?

Thanks,
Lee

P.S.  This is hardly about "Eliot Spitzer" any more, but I don't think
I'll have too much more to say about this, so I guess I'll just go 
along with the general preference here alas, <sigh>, and hook in
those poor unsuspecting readers who want something about Eliot's
case or something directly relevant.