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  1. stu2b50
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    I have to say, I find the whole article just... confusing? The word "gentrification" in the title doesn't even make sense. The key part of gentrification is physical location; it's about wealthier...

    I have to say, I find the whole article just... confusing?

    The word "gentrification" in the title doesn't even make sense. The key part of gentrification is physical location; it's about wealthier inhabitants moving into an area, where they then live, and cause demand to rise for goods and services, which then cause prices to increase (and that tends to displace the prior residents). If you just cut off the entirety of the definition up until "prices increase", then it's just lobotomizing the word until you get a synonym for inflation.

    I can't get a feel for what exactly it's trying to say. Price segmentation and price discrimination is not exactly new practice. Increasing your reach into price segments you weren't already in is just normal practice. You can find examples of brands doing both - Netflix, for instance, wants to move downmarket with its ad-tier subscription.

    I don't know why people think companies are obsessed with profit margins when they're obsessed by profits. High margin businesses are nice, as they tend to operate in markets with less elastic demand, but Walmart is Walmart by being low margin. They could move into a higher margin business by being Whole Foods, but they're not going to, since they make more profit being Walmart.

    It doesn't contain any even hypothetical examples of "big swaths of the economy are at risk of becoming gentrified, raising the possibility that poorer consumers will be increasingly underserved", it doesn't try to give statistics or numbers to back their hypothesis of increased "gentrification" in the economy, it doesn't try explain why the latter would be happening other than "companies would like to have higher prices".

    11 votes