"Corporations only act as ethical as their subset of consumers, and consumers only are pressured to only act as ethical as their value-maximizing formulas allow them to be. This means that making...
"Corporations only act as ethical as their subset of consumers, and consumers only are pressured to only act as ethical as their value-maximizing formulas allow them to be. This means that making a premature leap towards offering more progressive yet more expensive products or services comes with risk."
This really stands out and puts a lens back on how us as consumers make decisions.
Consumers are often underpaid and aren't always able to pay more for more expensive items. The issue isn't simply consumer choice, it's the entire mechanism of capitalism.
Consumers are often underpaid and aren't always able to pay more for more expensive items. The issue isn't simply consumer choice, it's the entire mechanism of capitalism.
I wonder if consumers are more sensitive to price than other factors (like fair trade and sustainability) because price is basically the only reliable signal. I would like to make more ethical...
I wonder if consumers are more sensitive to price than other factors (like fair trade and sustainability) because price is basically the only reliable signal.
I would like to make more ethical shopping decisions. But the idea of trying to sort out the non-price qualities of everything I buy means trying to cut through the noise of a sea of marketing and advertising strategies. It's almost impossible to be sure you're getting unbiased information about these factors.
Even "voting with my feet" or avoiding certain products means choosing among a small number of alternatives that may not be any better. The amount of research that it would take to sort this out for every product I buy would overwhelm me. But the price is the price. I can see it and I know I'm going to pay it.
Like, when you get into the food web of what Nestle owns. I check it every now and again to make sure of things but there's just too much and I can't extend the weekly shopping trip by scanning...
The amount of research that it would take to sort this out for every product I buy would overwhelm me.
Like, when you get into the food web of what Nestle owns. I check it every now and again to make sure of things but there's just too much and I can't extend the weekly shopping trip by scanning every single barcode through some sustainability app only to realize I'm screwed because half my list falls into something I can't bring myself to support.
I don't get why people tend to think this way. It's really easy to avoid megacorporations like Nestle. Simply avoid buying name brand products. I have found that in recent years it's rarely true...
I don't get why people tend to think this way. It's really easy to avoid megacorporations like Nestle. Simply avoid buying name brand products. I have found that in recent years it's rarely true that the generic stuff is worse than the name brands, and even when it is the difference isn't very dramatic at all. It's possible that they're actually providing for the generic brands, true, but at the very least they make less money from it.
But hey, what if there's something that there is no generic version of? Allow me to give you a different way to think of that product. When you go to the store to buy it, you're literally standing in a warehouse full of different things you could be eating. You don't have to eat that one thing. Think about why you want it. If you cannot live without it, it's addictive and isn't healthy for you. Your life will be better without it. Even if you replace it with a different addiction, at least the world will be a little bit better for it.
Granted, I also believe this is a general problem with Capitalism. If it's not going to be Nestle committing the atrocities, it's going to be someone else. So I agree with your sentiment.
Less money is still money. Sorry I missed that part of your post. It just sucks that there isn't really a reasonable way to completely 100% ignore these conglomerates.
Less money is still money. Sorry I missed that part of your post.
It just sucks that there isn't really a reasonable way to completely 100% ignore these conglomerates.
I wouldn't agree. I'm eating a whole foods plant based diet so when it comes to food I can't even eat most of the stuff these corporations make. But I know that's not a solution that most people...
I wouldn't agree. I'm eating a whole foods plant based diet so when it comes to food I can't even eat most of the stuff these corporations make. But I know that's not a solution that most people would be willing to accept.
This may be true in some cases, but also may not be true in others. I don't really know if there is a way for us to know. Generics can be cheaper than name brands because name brands you're partly...
It's possible that they're actually providing for the generic brands, true, but at the very least they make less money from it.
This may be true in some cases, but also may not be true in others. I don't really know if there is a way for us to know. Generics can be cheaper than name brands because name brands you're partly paying for the brand, you're paying for all the advertising that goes into recognizing that brand. It's the whole reason why advertisers basically pay for you to watch things or at least subsidize part of the cost for you to watch things, because you end up paying the cost later when you go buy the name brand products being advertised.
So the true cost of the name brand product could be quite a bit lower, with the marketing costs inflating the product cost, but the profit margins of the name brand product could be similar to what they make selling it to some store that labels it as the store brand because they don't have to pay the marketing costs to sell that product.
In my personal opinion, if the only positive effect of everyone avoiding buying name brand goods is less advertising, it's still a win. Advertising is a scourge.
In my personal opinion, if the only positive effect of everyone avoiding buying name brand goods is less advertising, it's still a win. Advertising is a scourge.
We can choose the things that matter most to us, but there's very rarely a perfect choice. The more things you try to prioritize, the more expensive it gets. If I can't afford to buy fair trade so...
Exemplary
We can choose the things that matter most to us, but there's very rarely a perfect choice. The more things you try to prioritize, the more expensive it gets.
If I can't afford to buy fair trade so I don't buy those products at all, does it actually do those fair trade farmers any good? Is that more ethical than splurging on a chocolate bar I can afford once in a while?
I was looking into local eggs a whole back, and the whole thing is incredibly confusing.
One local place is $9/dozen
Certified Humane, Cage Free, and Certified 100% Organic.
From the time they were baby chicks they have been enjoying a cage free lifestyle, enjoying access to the outdoors. They are never given any hormones or antibiotics.
Another is $10/dozen
produces pasture-raised hens that are free to roam on certified organic fields. This humane approach allows the chickens to act in their natural behavior; being able to run, jump fly and roll and dust their bodies in rich soils for natural skin protection.
The cheapest eggs at the grocery store are $1.73/dozen. The organic ones are $5/dozen. The cage free ones are $5.50/dozen. The free range ones are $6/dozen. The pasture raised ones are $7/dozen. The organic free range ones are $7.50/dozen.
I really wanted eggs from the last tortured chickens possible, so I kept digging.
Cage free has a USDA meaning, the chickens aren't kept in cages. They don't have access to the outdoors. It doesn't mean they have access to the outside and doesn't specify how much space they get.
Free range also has USDA meaning. All it means is access to the outdoors. Nothing about them actually going outside and nothing about how much space they get - it could be 1 square foot for a hundred chickens.
Pasture raised doesn't have a USDA meaning. "Certified humane" is an actual organization that requires 108 square feet of outdoor space for each hen and barn space indoors.
I live in a city where people are allowed to keep chickens. I honestly don't want to keep chickens; I'm aware that it isn't a minor undertaking and it's enough trouble to get my cats taken care of when I go on vacation. Happily, someone down the street has started selling eggs for $5-6/dozen, I forget which. I can see the chickens running around in her backyard near a cute little coop. I'm really lucky to have this option, most people don't.
For someone using food stamps or WIC, the choice is clear. My state WIC actually says not to buy free-range, pasteurized, or pasture-raised eggs. Apparently ethics are only for people who can afford them, just like the fast lane you can pay to drive in.
Considering the problem you described with the definitions of those being rather lackadaisical, that might actually be the most responsible thing for WIC to do. Though I suspect even if the...
My state WIC actually says not to buy free-range, pasteurized, or pasture-raised eggs.
Considering the problem you described with the definitions of those being rather lackadaisical, that might actually be the most responsible thing for WIC to do. Though I suspect even if the definitions were more clear and not easily circumvented to lower costs, WIC or other such programs still would not allow for their purchase.
I think it’s true that consumer preferences and behavior place some constraints on what companies can do, but the article is rather pessimistic in calling this a “catch-22.” A more optimistic take...
I think it’s true that consumer preferences and behavior place some constraints on what companies can do, but the article is rather pessimistic in calling this a “catch-22.” A more optimistic take is that there’s still plenty of room for maneuver within those constraints.
Yes, consumers don’t like higher prices when they don’t see any advantage, but it’s sometimes possible to explain the benefits. It takes marketing and often, some kind of oversight.
Consider what it means to buy organic. It’s something you can’t see, so to us, it’s just a label. People are often distrustful of marketing, for good reason, and largely ignorant of farming, so there will need to be either government or private certification. This determines what the “organic” label actually means in practice.
Also, the supply chain is largely opaque and companies have a lot of latitude to change business processes without consumers noticing. Cost is often associated with waste and excess use of environment resources. There are both ethical and unethical ways to cut costs. Usually, we don’t know and don’t need to know, but there’s still room for improvements.
One important force for change would be getting prices closer to right throughout the supply chain. A carbon tax, for example, should result in companies making better choices about all sorts of things we never heard of deep in the supply chain.
Costco is certainly an outlier when it comes to the retail sector, but I don't think that their model works absolutely everywhere. They have the luxury of catering to the middle class an up. Many...
Costco is certainly an outlier when it comes to the retail sector, but I don't think that their model works absolutely everywhere. They have the luxury of catering to the middle class an up. Many people can't afford to spend $60 just for the privilege of stepping into the store to then buy high-priced items (priced high because of quantity). But that $60 is pure profit for Costco, and accounts for 75% of their net profits. Similarly, most stores don't offer a level of product or service that consumers would be willing to pay a fee to shop for.
Costco also doesn't offer a lot of product choice, to the point that you could never do 100% of your grocery shopping there. It will always need to be supplemented by something else. But they have a strong enough cult following that people are willing to shop there knowing that it won't be one-stop and they'll have to go somewhere else for the rest of their groceries. There is not enough room in the market for very many brands to have that kind of cult following.
But overall, kudos to them for operating the way that they do. They don't struggle to hire retail workers like pretty much everywhere else (corporate and IT are another story), and their employee retention would also save them some money in the long run. That's hopefully a lesson to be learned by other companies who pay and treat their workers poorly in an attempt to save money.
"Corporations only act as ethical as their subset of consumers, and consumers only are pressured to only act as ethical as their value-maximizing formulas allow them to be. This means that making a premature leap towards offering more progressive yet more expensive products or services comes with risk."
This really stands out and puts a lens back on how us as consumers make decisions.
Consumers are often underpaid and aren't always able to pay more for more expensive items. The issue isn't simply consumer choice, it's the entire mechanism of capitalism.
I wonder if consumers are more sensitive to price than other factors (like fair trade and sustainability) because price is basically the only reliable signal.
I would like to make more ethical shopping decisions. But the idea of trying to sort out the non-price qualities of everything I buy means trying to cut through the noise of a sea of marketing and advertising strategies. It's almost impossible to be sure you're getting unbiased information about these factors.
Even "voting with my feet" or avoiding certain products means choosing among a small number of alternatives that may not be any better. The amount of research that it would take to sort this out for every product I buy would overwhelm me. But the price is the price. I can see it and I know I'm going to pay it.
Like, when you get into the food web of what Nestle owns. I check it every now and again to make sure of things but there's just too much and I can't extend the weekly shopping trip by scanning every single barcode through some sustainability app only to realize I'm screwed because half my list falls into something I can't bring myself to support.
I don't get why people tend to think this way. It's really easy to avoid megacorporations like Nestle. Simply avoid buying name brand products. I have found that in recent years it's rarely true that the generic stuff is worse than the name brands, and even when it is the difference isn't very dramatic at all. It's possible that they're actually providing for the generic brands, true, but at the very least they make less money from it.
But hey, what if there's something that there is no generic version of? Allow me to give you a different way to think of that product. When you go to the store to buy it, you're literally standing in a warehouse full of different things you could be eating. You don't have to eat that one thing. Think about why you want it. If you cannot live without it, it's addictive and isn't healthy for you. Your life will be better without it. Even if you replace it with a different addiction, at least the world will be a little bit better for it.
Granted, I also believe this is a general problem with Capitalism. If it's not going to be Nestle committing the atrocities, it's going to be someone else. So I agree with your sentiment.
Most generics are also produced in the same factories by the same companies that make the brand name products.
Allow me to quote myself.
Less money is still money. Sorry I missed that part of your post.
It just sucks that there isn't really a reasonable way to completely 100% ignore these conglomerates.
I wouldn't agree. I'm eating a whole foods plant based diet so when it comes to food I can't even eat most of the stuff these corporations make. But I know that's not a solution that most people would be willing to accept.
This may be true in some cases, but also may not be true in others. I don't really know if there is a way for us to know. Generics can be cheaper than name brands because name brands you're partly paying for the brand, you're paying for all the advertising that goes into recognizing that brand. It's the whole reason why advertisers basically pay for you to watch things or at least subsidize part of the cost for you to watch things, because you end up paying the cost later when you go buy the name brand products being advertised.
So the true cost of the name brand product could be quite a bit lower, with the marketing costs inflating the product cost, but the profit margins of the name brand product could be similar to what they make selling it to some store that labels it as the store brand because they don't have to pay the marketing costs to sell that product.
In my personal opinion, if the only positive effect of everyone avoiding buying name brand goods is less advertising, it's still a win. Advertising is a scourge.
100% with you on that, I despise advertising.
We can choose the things that matter most to us, but there's very rarely a perfect choice. The more things you try to prioritize, the more expensive it gets.
If I can't afford to buy fair trade so I don't buy those products at all, does it actually do those fair trade farmers any good? Is that more ethical than splurging on a chocolate bar I can afford once in a while?
I was looking into local eggs a whole back, and the whole thing is incredibly confusing.
One local place is $9/dozen
Another is $10/dozen
The cheapest eggs at the grocery store are $1.73/dozen. The organic ones are $5/dozen. The cage free ones are $5.50/dozen. The free range ones are $6/dozen. The pasture raised ones are $7/dozen. The organic free range ones are $7.50/dozen.
I really wanted eggs from the last tortured chickens possible, so I kept digging.
Cage free has a USDA meaning, the chickens aren't kept in cages. They don't have access to the outdoors. It doesn't mean they have access to the outside and doesn't specify how much space they get.
Free range also has USDA meaning. All it means is access to the outdoors. Nothing about them actually going outside and nothing about how much space they get - it could be 1 square foot for a hundred chickens.
Pasture raised doesn't have a USDA meaning. "Certified humane" is an actual organization that requires 108 square feet of outdoor space for each hen and barn space indoors.
I live in a city where people are allowed to keep chickens. I honestly don't want to keep chickens; I'm aware that it isn't a minor undertaking and it's enough trouble to get my cats taken care of when I go on vacation. Happily, someone down the street has started selling eggs for $5-6/dozen, I forget which. I can see the chickens running around in her backyard near a cute little coop. I'm really lucky to have this option, most people don't.
For someone using food stamps or WIC, the choice is clear. My state WIC actually says not to buy free-range, pasteurized, or pasture-raised eggs. Apparently ethics are only for people who can afford them, just like the fast lane you can pay to drive in.
Considering the problem you described with the definitions of those being rather lackadaisical, that might actually be the most responsible thing for WIC to do. Though I suspect even if the definitions were more clear and not easily circumvented to lower costs, WIC or other such programs still would not allow for their purchase.
Not allowing pasteurized surprised me more.
True, I kind of glossed over that since it was book-ended by terms that don't mean much of anything.
That's totally fair. I was pretty long winded.
I think it’s true that consumer preferences and behavior place some constraints on what companies can do, but the article is rather pessimistic in calling this a “catch-22.” A more optimistic take is that there’s still plenty of room for maneuver within those constraints.
Yes, consumers don’t like higher prices when they don’t see any advantage, but it’s sometimes possible to explain the benefits. It takes marketing and often, some kind of oversight.
Consider what it means to buy organic. It’s something you can’t see, so to us, it’s just a label. People are often distrustful of marketing, for good reason, and largely ignorant of farming, so there will need to be either government or private certification. This determines what the “organic” label actually means in practice.
Also, the supply chain is largely opaque and companies have a lot of latitude to change business processes without consumers noticing. Cost is often associated with waste and excess use of environment resources. There are both ethical and unethical ways to cut costs. Usually, we don’t know and don’t need to know, but there’s still room for improvements.
One important force for change would be getting prices closer to right throughout the supply chain. A carbon tax, for example, should result in companies making better choices about all sorts of things we never heard of deep in the supply chain.
Costco is certainly an outlier when it comes to the retail sector, but I don't think that their model works absolutely everywhere. They have the luxury of catering to the middle class an up. Many people can't afford to spend $60 just for the privilege of stepping into the store to then buy high-priced items (priced high because of quantity). But that $60 is pure profit for Costco, and accounts for 75% of their net profits. Similarly, most stores don't offer a level of product or service that consumers would be willing to pay a fee to shop for.
Costco also doesn't offer a lot of product choice, to the point that you could never do 100% of your grocery shopping there. It will always need to be supplemented by something else. But they have a strong enough cult following that people are willing to shop there knowing that it won't be one-stop and they'll have to go somewhere else for the rest of their groceries. There is not enough room in the market for very many brands to have that kind of cult following.
But overall, kudos to them for operating the way that they do. They don't struggle to hire retail workers like pretty much everywhere else (corporate and IT are another story), and their employee retention would also save them some money in the long run. That's hopefully a lesson to be learned by other companies who pay and treat their workers poorly in an attempt to save money.