How do freer, market-based economies compare to less-freer ones? Very well.
Here are some compelling statistics. Start on page 22, exhibit 1.6.
This is a pretty smart way of following up with people that are trying out your software. Its a little hard to see but that’s an ad for the non-free version of Visual suggesting that I upgrade and a registration email from Microsoft welcoming me to the free edition.
Did they buy an ad to match the automated email welcoming to the free version of software? The ad appears on the inbox page too.
Recently I’ve been receiving automated calls trying to sell me something. The call starts with a recorded message and if you press 9, you’ll be removed from the list but if you press 1 you can speak with someone.
What’s the right thing to do? Pressing 9 is the fast way our but it only you feel the cost. The variable labor costs of the seller stay lower when you press 9.
So, if I have a free moment, I always try to talk to a person and drag the conversation on as long as possible in order to help add to the cost of the telemarketing service. The fewer sales per hour these folks make, the lower their margins. By having a short conversation with them, rather than pressing 9 to be removed from the list, I feel like I’m doing my small little part.
How do you get large numbers of people to cooperate and do this? If enough calls led to non-sales, the cost of the service would rise and perhaps cause them to non longer exist (or find new ways to spam). Perhaps the word could be spread via an automated phone campaign?
Having been a customer of a failed bank (NetBank) I certainly enjoy the service provided by the FDIC. However, the recent increase in FDIC limits certainly will make it an easier choice for investors to move from equities to cash positions. Will this drive stock prices lower?
Here’s a little thought experiment…
The presidential elections, as opposed to local and state ones, are all highly popular right now in the media. From the perspective of a TV network, there is a much larger audience affected by the national election than smaller elections so most coverage is on the more generally applicable topic.
However, each person’s impact on the presidential election is nearly zero so a very rational choice would be to ignore the presidential election entirely and not even bother watching given you can do nearly nothing to affect it. But, if this were the case, then the large audience needed for media coverage to be economical would dry up and you’d see much, much less coverage.
Obviously this isn’t isn’t the case — the presidential election is hugely popular. I’m guessing this is due to at least two reasons:
1) People don’t really care to learn about candidates so they can make an informed choice. Instead they primarily receive entertainment/emotional value from election coverage. Elections give people something to feel good and/or angry about.
2) People feel like they will make a difference. Its true you might a very small, but the very small impact you might have certainly doesn’t warrant the large amount of time spent focused on the process.
Off to watch CNN… ;)
