Dear Idiots...
People are so stupid sometimes, especially about math. The best evidence for this is the current gas hike and also the current trend for "lower" gas prices. The other day, a local gas station was found to be rigging their pumps and thus were fined out of business and the rest of the gas was to be given away at 50 cents a gallon off the normal rate.
WHAT A DEAL, YAY.
So of course 7 million people showed up and people were waiting more than an hour to get this special rate of gas. Ok, let's say you have a 15 gallon tank. You save yourself $7.50. You're going to wait in a stupid line for hours for SEVEN DOLLARS?!? I still see people wait half an hour to get gas that is like 8 cents cheaper than everywhere else. Again, the math says they are waiting half an hour for $1.20 but do they even think about that? NOPE. They think like this-
Thought 1: I know that I have to buy a lot of gallons.
Thought 2: That is a small amount but there is a lot of gallons of gas.
Concluding thought: This must mean that by the end of the 4 million gallons of gas I have to buy, that I will be saving 4 million times 4 cents which is a lot of money.
This goes for anything. Sour cream at Costco is only a savings if you ever use that much sour cream. Routinely, people don't work the math out in their heads and business people know that and trick them all the time like the lemmings they are.
posted by Clupbert @ 5:47 AM
3
comments
3 Comments:
I know quite a few people who do the Costco thing. They'd drive in an SUV for a half hour to buy a small item assuming it was cheaper there, not realizing they spent more on gas than they would have on several of those items.
I also heard a story about a guy who won a prize for economics by figuring out that if you sell a $25 calculator for $20 and a $120 pair of pants for $115, people are far far far more likely to drive across town to pick up the calculator than the pants. Basically, people like to take advantage of good deals. Why do you think flyers are so important?
Oh No! YOu found out our secrets....
umm.. be right back!
People who shop all the time are generally stupid. They say, "But it was a good deal!". It's only a good deal if you were going to buy it in the first place, otherwise, it's money you weren't going to spend and it's ultimately costing you more.
I bet alot of those people who wait an hour to save $7 in gas carry a balance on the credit card that they use to pay for the gas. Probably costs them more in interest than they're saving.
Post a Comment
<< Home