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Well, they're all discounts, for starters. Surveillance pricing defenders claim that surveillance pricing is better because it works both ways--it might offer

Well, they're all discounts, for starters. Surveillance pricing defenders claim that surveillance pricing is better because it works both ways--it might offer a higher price to someone who is desperate, but someone who is likely not that motivated might get a sweet deal. I highly doubt that. A highly-advertised, transparent discount or sale is how you sell to someone who is not that motivated. Surveillance pricing is how you (secretly) extract as much money as possible from the desperate.

pc86 2mo ago
> Well, they're all discounts, for starters. And they're subsidized by the revenue made by everyone else. A thousands of coupons start rolling in and meaningfully affecting revenue either the coupons go away or the MSRP increases. It's the exact same pig just slightly different lipstick.
- ellen364 2mo ago
  It doesn't really seem the same. In coupon hunting, I might not want to spend time finding a coupon and decide to pay full price. That's my choice. In surveillance pricing, I wouldn't get that choice, I'd just get a custom-to-me price. I'd have no idea how the company decided to charge me more or less than they charged my friend. And no idea how to change the price I'm offered, so it would be terrible if the algorithm decided to charge me +15% for everything.
  - gruez 2mo ago
    >In surveillance pricing, I wouldn't get that choice, I'd just get a custom-to-me price. I'd have no idea how the company decided to charge me more or less than they charged my friend. And no idea how to change the price I'm offered, so it would be terrible if the algorithm decided to charge me +15% for everything. What's the difference between this and the company charging an absurdly high base price, then your discount is "customized" to you? That's basically how universities work with various scholarship and financial aid schemes working as discounts.
- Eisenstein 2mo ago
  What you are saying is that the amount of money people save getting discounts is made up by increases to the retail price for everyone else, and that this is equal to the extra money that individually priced people would pay or receive or discounts, so its a wash? This assumes that the business would raise prices to make more money from people who they think can pay it and give that back to others as a discount. Do you have evidence this would be the case?
  - gruez 2mo ago
    >This assumes that the business would raise prices to make more money from people who they think can pay it and give that back to others as a discount. >Do you have evidence this would be the case? This is pretty standard economics: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_discrimination https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_discrimination
    - Eisenstein 2mo ago
      1. That didn't answer my question 2. Do you have evidence that the we are operating under standard economics when massive personalized data collection is being used in conjunction with AI to individualize pricing per consumer instead of per market segment?
- iAMkenough 2mo ago
  Now you’re on a list that indefinitely upcharges everyone that uses the “lipstick on a pig” idiom. Utilized by multiple big retailers.
- robrtsql 2mo ago
  I think I'm more OK with it if the price segmentation happens based on the amount of effort the consumer is willing to put in. I'm much less OK with it if price segmentation happens based on demographics, especially immutable ones.
arjie 2mo ago
Is it just a matter of the 'turbo' button then? Surveillance pricing could be reframed to be entirely discount based. A banana shall be $10k/unit and then it is discounted either $9999 or $9998 depending on who you are? It seems fairly equivalent. I don't like it either because I don't want the vendor to extract almost all the surplus from the relationship but I suppose I could get that by just settling for fewer things and only buying where the price does not capture surplus.
- AngryData 2mo ago
  As long as the company must clearly show the base original price I would be more amenable to it. But personally I think goods should have one singular price for everybody. They can set their out the door price however they want, but anybody else should also be able to buy it at that price at the same time.
- inigyou 2mo ago
  Nobody would show up to a shop where the base price is $10000 for a candy bar. They'd never get to see how big their discount is.

pc86 2mo ago

> Well, they're all discounts, for starters. And they're subsidized by the revenue made by everyone else. A thousands of coupons start rolling in and meaningfully affecting revenue either the coupons go away or the MSRP increases. It's the exact same pig just slightly different lipstick.

ellen364 2mo ago
It doesn't really seem the same. In coupon hunting, I might not want to spend time finding a coupon and decide to pay full price. That's my choice. In surveillance pricing, I wouldn't get that choice, I'd just get a custom-to-me price. I'd have no idea how the company decided to charge me more or less than they charged my friend. And no idea how to change the price I'm offered, so it would be terrible if the algorithm decided to charge me +15% for everything.
- gruez 2mo ago
  >In surveillance pricing, I wouldn't get that choice, I'd just get a custom-to-me price. I'd have no idea how the company decided to charge me more or less than they charged my friend. And no idea how to change the price I'm offered, so it would be terrible if the algorithm decided to charge me +15% for everything. What's the difference between this and the company charging an absurdly high base price, then your discount is "customized" to you? That's basically how universities work with various scholarship and financial aid schemes working as discounts.
Eisenstein 2mo ago
What you are saying is that the amount of money people save getting discounts is made up by increases to the retail price for everyone else, and that this is equal to the extra money that individually priced people would pay or receive or discounts, so its a wash? This assumes that the business would raise prices to make more money from people who they think can pay it and give that back to others as a discount. Do you have evidence this would be the case?
- gruez 2mo ago
  >This assumes that the business would raise prices to make more money from people who they think can pay it and give that back to others as a discount. >Do you have evidence this would be the case? This is pretty standard economics: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_discrimination https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Price_discrimination
  - Eisenstein 2mo ago
    1. That didn't answer my question 2. Do you have evidence that the we are operating under standard economics when massive personalized data collection is being used in conjunction with AI to individualize pricing per consumer instead of per market segment?
iAMkenough 2mo ago
Now you’re on a list that indefinitely upcharges everyone that uses the “lipstick on a pig” idiom. Utilized by multiple big retailers.
robrtsql 2mo ago
I think I'm more OK with it if the price segmentation happens based on the amount of effort the consumer is willing to put in. I'm much less OK with it if price segmentation happens based on demographics, especially immutable ones.

arjie 2mo ago

Is it just a matter of the 'turbo' button then? Surveillance pricing could be reframed to be entirely discount based. A banana shall be $10k/unit and then it is discounted either $9999 or $9998 depending on who you are? It seems fairly equivalent. I don't like it either because I don't want the vendor to extract almost all the surplus from the relationship but I suppose I could get that by just settling for fewer things and only buying where the price does not capture surplus.

AngryData 2mo ago
As long as the company must clearly show the base original price I would be more amenable to it. But personally I think goods should have one singular price for everybody. They can set their out the door price however they want, but anybody else should also be able to buy it at that price at the same time.
inigyou 2mo ago
Nobody would show up to a shop where the base price is $10000 for a candy bar. They'd never get to see how big their discount is.