Archive for the 'economics' Category

Pizza, Wings, and a Story of Redundancy

Published
by
Ehren
on September 7, 2008
in Mentions, Ponderings, economics and marketing
. 0 Comments

Every summer (sometimes more frequently) my family enjoys travelling into the U.S. to perform the ritual that Canadian retailers just love to hate and consumers absolutely love — cross-border shopping at those renowned outlet malls.

I won’t get started on the rather horrid amount of consumption that takes place.  That will be for another blog.  What I did find interesting was the conversation surrounding Canadian vs. American outlet malls.  My mom’s a pretty savvy shopper (in fact, she’s the only shopper in my immediate family) and I asked why not just go to the Canadian outlet mall?  Her answer was simple and concise:  The stuff they sell there [the Canadian ones] is substandard in quality and typically older in style.

Off topic:  Ever wonder?
Just a random thought that came across my mind while I was dragging my heels during my typically painful journey across what is referred to as an outlet mall. Are you ever in the situation where you don’t know where the deals are? Well after observing people at two outlet malls this past weekend, I’ve noticed that surrounding particular stores are groups of men standing or sitting around with blank looks on their faces. After waiting between 30 minutes to an hour, there is a small family reunion. I have a feeling that those stores may just be the ones with the deals :)

What surprises me is that no one has thought of doing something for the many men and women who are standing or sitting around waiting for the avid shopper to return.

Wow.  Way to go Canadian retailers.  People cross states or countries and great distances to arrive at these American outlet malls — my mom won’t even bother going to a Canadian retailer anymore and it’s only a 15 minute drive away.  I won’t even bother going to a retailer anymore, I order online (internationally thank you … thank you).

After conversing with my dad about Canadian retailers (quite the relevant topic) while waiting for my mom to finish her shopping expedition, I’ve arrived at two thoughts:

  • With cross-border competition and the Internet, Canadian retailers still rely enormously and depend on impulse and lazy consumers who don’t bother or want to compare prices with other places.
  • Canadians must love paying for convenience.  What’s wrong with us?

While you may think I’m taking this opportunity to bash Canadian retailers, you’re right — I am because I think both consumers and businesses need to smarten up.  On the other hand, I also wanted to show a small long-time family-run business has continued to thrive in a pure competition environment.

Almost a little more than a decade ago (I’d be 17 at the time) my family was on the road and in Niagara Falls, New York to perform the cross-border ritual when we ran across a pizza and wing place.  Sure, we had plenty of places to choose from but com’on, Pizza Hut?  Pizza Nova?  So many other chains and pizza places –  lame…

Instead my parents decided on a place called Buzzy’s.  It was a very tiny place at the time but not too recently they’ve been renovating and slowly growing their business.  All I have to say is that I have never ever seen that place empty before.  They have some of the best “Buffalo style” chicken wings and pizza I’ve tasted in the U.S.  In fact, my family makes it part of the cross-border ritual to stop off and join the mob that’s waiting in line to enjoy Buzzy’s pizza and wings.  After 10+ years, I know that when I’m going to Buzzy’s, I’m going to get long lineups and awesome food.  It’s part of the experience when I travel through the Buffalo, NY area.  Same with so many other people who are travelling through.

Not the best looking building, but the food is good!

Is there any business you know of that creates that sort of impact and is thriving?  Repeat (and ecstastic) customers from other countries and provinces/states for years?

What makes them different from the rest?

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Lay Down the Blame Arrow and Look in the Mirror

Published
by
Ehren
on June 19, 2008
in Aspirations, Mentions, Ponderings, Unthinkables, books, economics, marketing and work
. 0 Comments

I’ve been itching to talk about the recently revamped copyright law in Canada but I’ve held back for the most part.  I decided otherwise after I was reading Matthew Ingram’s article in the Globe and Mail about music sales being the lowest in 20 years and that — yet again — the blame is placed on the customers, not buying enough and downloading illegal copies of music.  This by the way is untrue as new reports have surfaced.  This is beside the actual point of this post.

What I find amusing about every media industry (and I work in one) is that we continue to direct the blame away from ourselves.  The Music industry blames the internet and file-sharing sites; the video game industry blames the internet for game piracy; the movie industry of course blames the internet and file-sharing sites as well as video games; and the book industry blames all other industries for its troubles and for overshadowing the importance of books (plus one another internally).  What’s next?  Are we going to blame lower sales on the lack of fuel cell-powered vehicles in North America?

We all know the internet and customers are not really to blame.  We can try to delegate the blame but it really does not make a whole lot of sense in the end.  Many businesses are built upon taking advantage of current events, emotions and impulses that every consumer may have — if that’s the case, why wouldn’t a consumer do exactly the same to a business if provided with the opportunity?  Especially when there is usually little or no reason for a consumer to display any sign of loyalty.  Oh right, the law.

This law protects the rights of the creator or developer of a product and ensures that the creator or developer receives due credit ($$$) for their work.  I quite respect that.  This is vital to ensuring that people who are creative and innovative and who take risks will ultimately survive.  But where does it say that this risk is guaranteed to provide a complete return?

I think it is important for artists, authors, creators, and developers to receive credit for their work but I also feel that entire industries should not be complaining about customers and blaming them for their losses (or so-called losses in some cases) if they don’t receive the credit or attention that they expect for their work.

Why should we as customers care? Because customers don’t deserve the blame.  Customers deserve more — we all deserve something greater than what currently exists.

Businesses and creators currently dictate what should and shouldn’t be produced, what can and can’t be improved, what is and isn’t possible.  I respect business owners, shareholders, and in particular entrepreneurs because of the risk they take but I disagree with approaches that are focused on putting business before the customer.  Any company’s success is linked directly to their customers, not to the company internally.  It is we the customer who:

1. Decides what to pay for and what not to pay for.

2. Decide a product’s level of usefulness.

3. Ultimately find out the hard way what’s easy to use and not so easy to use

4. Discover which book was worth the read, what song was great to listen to, and what art we actually enjoy.

5. Are hurt or injured by the errors and mistakes in judgment that businesses make in the process of developing their product.

It is we the customer who deserve the right to want and demand more from businesses and creators.  Creators deserve the respect for their achievement but they ultimately serve those who are willing to embrace what they have produced and/or selling.

Customers are ultimately part of the product creation and development process — not simply the recipients.  I think social media websites are on the cutting edge in this field because they are forced to identify what they are doing wrong for the customer on an extremely frequent and consistent basis — and then make the appropriate changes.

I’m not saying that we have to take this route for all media, but I believe that it is important for all businesses to step in this direction.

Books and the Cycle of Blame

I can elaborate on books as a medium since I work in the book industry. It’s somewhat sad.  People blame video games taking attention away from reading.  People blame movies for that too … and television … and the internet … and anything else we can pretty much put our finger on.

That’s just reason number one for why books don’t sell as well as they used to.  Let’s take a look at other reasons that frequently pop up in the discussion, shall we?

Publishers blame booksellers for not pushing their books enough.

Publishers blame booksellers for not carrying greater numbers of books on their limited shelf space.

Publishers blame authors for not being more active and promoting the book.

Publishers blame government grants for not providing more support.

Booksellers blame publishers for not helping them out and doing more.

Booksellers blame publishers for selling direct over the internet.

Booksellers blame publishers for focusing on selling bulk quantities of books to larger chains such as Chapters, Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Costco, etc.

… and most recently, booksellers blame publishers for focusing on wholesalers and distributors.

Authors blame publishers for not pushing their books enough to booksellers.

Authors blame publishers for not helping them get more publicity.

This is all … wrong.

We complain about how people aren’t reading enough yet the opposite is true — there is more reading taking place than ever before.  Just not the way we think it SHOULD be.  Then again, when did we as the book industry earn the right to decide what SHOULD be?  The customer dictated what they wanted eons ago and now they are evolving.  The fact that we have tied ourselves so closely to what “should be” has ultimately hurt ourselves, damaged our credibility, while simultaneously forced us to ignore the customer.

Businesses and customers both have rights.  But the right to dictate what becomes successful and what doesn’t belongs to the customer.

Photograph by Jasoon

We have only ourselves to blame.  Just like the music industry, movie industry, and all other media industries.  We have not been listening to all of our customers.  We merely listened to the core group of people who refer to themselves as book readers/lovers.  Even when industry-wide sales started declining, we decided to point fingers at each other rather than look at ourselves or the way we actually do things — and instead of finding a way to adapt to the evolving customer, we continue to force the customer to adapt to us.  We argue amongst ourselves and tell each other this is simply how it is and that we need to keep publishing massive number of books in order to stay in business because the government grants favour specific types of books over others.  Is this the way we want to continue to operate into the future?

Now here is the true dilemma we face.  We keep thinking that ebooks are the future and are the solution to our problems — but they aren’t.  They are merely another medium that will converge with other media in time.  The key to solving our problems isn’t by looking for another way to push more books, it’s how we look at ourselves and what we sell.

Time to step in front of the mirror.

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Merry Christmas World

Published
by
Ehren
on December 25, 2007
in Aspirations, Interests, Mentions, Ponderings, Unthinkables, economics, fun, marketing and philosophy
. 1 Comment

How many things did you purchase this year for others? How much did you spend on yourself?  With the total amount of money you spent on yourself or others, how much influence can you wield around the world?

Despite my yearning to purchase a few items on my wishlist, I’ve painfully managed to refrain from doing so as well as from purchasing items for friends and family primarily because I want to see if I can push myself towards a state of mind where I do not feel the need to be purchasing massive number of gifts for everyone. I did receive a couple of small presents this year although I am trying to reduce that number.

This isn’t for a particular cause or some action against consumerism but rather my attempt at determining my level of freedom. The freedom that is the consequence of wanting fewer things in the world. We all have things that we need (to live) and want (to enjoy live comfortably). By no means am I preaching an ideology but rather this is to test my own ability to control the consumer in me — to be able to say no to purchasing something that I do not need but think would be neat to have, or to be able to wait until something is drastically lower in price.

It is funny that I am in marketing. Many people including my friends think of scams and very profit-driven individuals when the term marketing is mentioned. I think the problem is that the ones who are key in creating that perception are businesses (and individuals) with little regard for the power of other individuals and for that matter, consumers or the customer — maybe even society as a whole. I used to be a sceptic of marketing — until I realized that marketing is more than the sale.

Marketing is the ability to freely exchange ideas with an audience.  Ideas have a purpose but the individuals have the power to decide which idea they want to embrace.  There is one I embraced just recently.

I ran across an article detailing how the OLPC (One Laptop Per Child) project is doing. A few months ago, my sister and I decided to donate to the Give One Get One campaign to provide a child out there with a pretty spiffy little computer that uses very little power, is able to provide the child with nearly all the functions that we have on our power-hungry computers, and to also try out one of these laptops for ourselves and see how good it really is. Unfortunately, we haven’t received it yet so I can’t really speak on that topic yet. But I am happy to hear that children in Peru are beginning to reap the benefits of the initiative.

Merry Christmas World –  I hope for the best to come in 2008!

*** An amusing look at the past and present.

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One Aspect of Marketing that isn’t Really Marketing?

Published
by
Ehren
on December 4, 2007
in Aspirations, Interests, Mentions, Ponderings, Unthinkables, books, economics, marketing, policy and technology
. 0 Comments

I’m accustomed to reading a lot of business idea manifestos and the more or less revolutionary or evolutionary ideas of people such as Patricia Martin, Seth Godin and Chris Anderson. Whether it is the form of marketing in customer service or the theory behind the long tail, I find a lot of people are so focused on their core business that they really forget about their key business. I got talking with a colleague at work and I explained why I felt independent booksellers in Canada need to get their act together. It’s not that they are not great booksellers, it is just that they slow to realize that customer behaviour is shifting online, or they are reluctant to adapt to this trend.

The argument is that small booksellers do not have the resources for online marketing is valid and very true, and by no means am I suggesting that they take upon online marketing themselves when they are already short-staffed and short on resources. I however must point to the Canadian Booksellers Association and ask why the lack of vision? Why the lack of direction?

The first step towards an online presence IS NOT e-commerce. I think that is where independent booksellers are mistaken. What should be happening is a result-based campaign focused on bringing awareness of independent booksellers across Canada. How? I point to the American initiative — Booksense.com

I’m allowed to make fun of myself — I am in marketing. Sometimes I think this is true of all marketers when we’re so focused on our core business that we forget about our actual business.

Why does it work so well as a first step?

It’s all about making it easier for consumer to find you. Booksense.com just simply asks the visitor to type in their zip code and it automatically brings up the closest local independent bookstores. Is that so hard to create? Instead we have a difficult to navigate website.

My colleague who happens to be a very loyal supporter of independent booksellers argued that people should know about them and consumers should just go find out about them. Very true and ideally, this should work but here’s why it hasn’t worked and it will continue that way until independent booksellers change their strategy.

The first element that is working against an independent bookseller is brand and the fact that I can recognize only Chapters or Amazon indicates that it is one strike against them.

The second element is pricing and well, that’s just not going to be something that can be addressed in the industry.  Big retailers can under cut the pricing of any small retailer easily.  There just isn’t any way around that.  You can only differentiate in order to compete.

The third element is whether or not the consumer is aware. You may judge me however you may want — but I can honestly say that until I finished my publishing program in school a couple of years ago, I did not even know about independent booksellers. I understood that there may be a small bookstore here and there, but I had no idea that there were so many. My friend pointed out that there was a huge marketing campaign to promote buying from local independent bookstores so I should have known. Should — exactly the word that will cause a marketing plan to fail, and precisely how that marketing campaign failed me as a consumer by not equipping me with the freedom and options to shop elsewhere.

Did I notice it? — No.

Have I even heard of it? — No.

Where was it? Where was this campaign that was meant to encourage people to not buy from big box retail stores like Chapters Indigo? If I did not notice it, then think of how many people did not notice this campaign as well? If I did not know about independent booksellers then think of how many people how there that do not know about them as well?

Is it a bookseller’s role to promote themselves to every single consumer? — Definitely not!

Is it a bookseller’s role to ensure that they are easily found by all consumers? — Most definitely.

Ensuring that your business is easily found is my main point in this post. We are too focused on managing the processes of our daily lives and not looking forward. We are too busy focusing on who will buy it rather than focusing on who might be interested in it. We are so focused on the already converted — those who already love books that we forget about those who may just actually buy it if they knew more about it, but it requires more effort than simply promoting a book in the newspaper, hand selling a book, or hoping for a television interview.

We should spread some of that intense focus on to consumers who don’t view books as a high priority. Why? Just because they regard books as a second or third or lesser priority doesn’t mean that they are not a viable customer. Consumers are individuals of a great multi-faceted and multi-layered society, to reach them, we need to actually reach out in many different ways — or at the very least make it easy for these people to find us or the products we create. Is this marketing? To many it isn’t but it really is and ironically it is the most fundamental aspect.

Make life easier for them, help them find your local bookstore, and they may just happen to drop by and purchase a book. I don’t expect the independent booksellers to take action alone, but I do look towards the Canadian Bookseller Association for the leadership.

This was only the first step … there’s more but that’s enough out of me — for now.

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Five Things that I dislike about the Amazon Kindle

Published
by
Ehren
on November 19, 2007
in Interests, Mentions, Ponderings, ecommerce, economics, marketing, reviews, technology, web 2.0 and work
. 0 Comments

I know. Everyone and their great-grandmother has been blogging about the Amazon Kindle today. I figure I might as well jump on the bandwagon so that my two cents can be heard or ignored. More likely to be ignored amongst so many voices.

Being in the publishing industry, I hear a lot of opinions on e-book readers. A lot of negative opinions that almost make it seem to me as if people want the device to fail before anyone really tries it out. I think it’s possible that a lot of people may feel threatened by this device to some degree. The decrease in the price of books, the potential devaluation of a printed book or figuratively speaking, the product as a whole. I disagree — I believe technology has been the key factor in preventing books from reaching even larger audiences than before. I believe that technology is the threshold that prevents or allows any individual book from becoming a bestseller. (Hint: Chris Anderson’s Long Tail)

There are many arguments about why books are so difficult to sell, one primary argument being made by book publishers is the fact that most consumers find little appeal in books by comparison to other products. That is not to say there is no appeal (think relative), but the fact that most consumers find that they would much prefer to spend a hundred dollars on say, a digital camera (alas, a potentially crappy one) than spend $19.99 on a paperback. Consumers also compare movies and music to books. Unfortunately, books tend to have a high production cost and the fact that book publishers decided to print their list price on every book makes life rather difficult for themselves.

One peculiar behaviour of mine (I don’t know about anyone else) is that price is a huge decision indicator in the purchase of a book. Well, not quite but hear me out. If I were to say, see a book that is $29.99 and it was of interest to me, there would be some potential that I may just purchase it. Nevertheless, it’d really really need to be interesting to me.

Now compare that with an e-book that is being sold online for around $9.99 - $15.99. You’ve got my attention. As long as I am interested in the content of that book, I will likely buy it. If I had an e-book reader, I would definitely buy it. Make it wireless — I am so there!! Why? I don’t know but I think that like many consumers, I may view content and data differently than I do a printed book. Similar to consumer reactions to fluctuations in gas prices except that we’re a little more stubborn. Sad? Yes … but perhaps this is a positive outcome for book publishers (who will soon be referred to as content creators or managers) because the profit margin may actually widen. Could this mean better pay for myself and industry colleagues? Possibly … but I won’t touch that topic anytime soon … ha!

Honestly, I really like the Amazon Kindle. I love the idea, the concept, the launch and even it’s damn-ugly appearance (which isn’t really that ugly now that I think about it). But there are five things that I feel I need addressed before I would be willing to dish out the chunk of change for this quality piece of literary hardware.

  1. No Wi-Fi capability — I am sorry. Those who suggest it is not a big deal don’t understand that it’s a global issue.  I want to be able to use Wi-Fi hotspots if I want to, rather than the cell phone carrier frequencies.  Especially in Canada where carrier frequencies don’t necessarily have absolute coverage of the country (hello… Canada?).
  2. No Colour (yet…) — I want to be able to see vivid colour photographs in the book and online! I know I am picky but for now it’s okay I guess.
  3. No Open Access — If I am going to buy an e-book reader, I don’t only want to buy books from Amazon or read books from Amazon. I want to be able to download a document from work and read it too! Don’t tell me to buy a PDA or else why would I spend $399 USD on a Kindle?
  4. No Book Cover Display — One of the things that makes a book … a book is it’s cover. Being from the publishing industry, a ridiculous amount of time goes into the book cover. Why couldn’t their be a display panel on the back or a top flap that closes on top of the main reading panel which would display the cover image in vivid colour to the reader and those who are in awe of the person who is going through his or her selection of books! (Hint: Think of what happens when someone opens up a book on the subway and the cover is facing outwards to the public.) Okay so more wishful thinking, I don’t mind if this is still black and white but still!
  5. No ability to surf the web freely — This one’s a popular one it seems. Why am I paying for access to various parts of the web that I could get for free? If you are going to offer a function, either make some form of value-added content that would entice people to pay or just don’t offer it at all. There’s just no point!

The Amazon Kindle is definitely a major step for the publishing industry and Amazon as a bookseller (or seller of content). Regardless of what people may think of the Kindle itself, the fact that the device is so connected to the online retailer makes it a much more potent agent of change than the Sony Reader.

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Quick Glance at Adobe, Microsoft and Google … oh and Yahoo

Published
by
Ehren
on April 17, 2007
in Mentions, Ponderings, applications, economics, technology and web 2.0
. 0 Comments

It seems like everyone’s busy this week trying to position themselves to dominate the market these days…

  • Microsoft wants the government to scrutinize Google’s purchase of DoubleClick (a rather large internet banner advertising agency in simple terms) — claiming monopolization. This is after Microsoft of course has strategically attempted numerous times to monopolize the PC, office applications, media players, game consoles, developer applications, internet browser … and most recently … media and design applications. Not too long ago, Microsoft introduced a line up of programs that compete against Adobe’s Creative Suite. We’ll see how that turns out. Competition is good, price war would be even better for consumers considering Adobe’s pricing strategy. That being said, price wars are never good for corporations.
  • Adobe has been pushing it’s Apollo, flash technology that further integrates web programming with the famous code that allows us all to stream video and animation on YouTube and numerous other sites. In fact, Adobe wants web developers to become pretty much application developers. If Apollo becomes widely accepted by software developers, suddenly we no longer need windows. Ironic isn’t it? But that’s also why Microsoft feels threatened and has introduced their own version of flash as well as another version of the portable document file (aka. the renowned PDF).
  • The direction that Adobe and Microsoft are taking is looking like sooner or later, anyone can build their own application with relative ease. I’m exaggerating … or am I?
  • Meanwhile, Google is busy pushing ahead to become the leader in advertising … oddly enough. But not without Microsoft grinding teeth and pointing fingers while Yahoo makes a leap and works on deals with more of the print media industry. Google has also stepped on Microsoft’s toes by announcing a powerpoint work-a-like.  Yahoo also decided to step on Google’s toes by introducing their own version of Google Checkout, except with Paypal.
  • Intel, the big chip company that brought the Core 2 Duo to Apple computers has been testing the waters by dipping its feet in Web 2.0 collaboration by partnering with some well-known rich internet application developers such as SixApart and Socialtext to bring the world SuiteTwo. That’s right, not one … but two.  And Intel is also pushing forward the flash-based portable computer.

So all in all it seems like it’s nothing out of the ordinary … in the life of big competition that is.

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Taxes, the Taxman and the Masses

Published
by
Ehren
on February 26, 2007
in Aspirations, Interests, Mentions, Ponderings, economics, policy and politics
. 0 Comments

Well it is almost time to file your income tax. Sitting on the buses these past couple of weeks, I keep noticing the Ufile ads plastered all over our public transit system. So that’s where our tax dollars go eh? To provide a century old forum for advertising to brainwash us … subtly. But that’s beside the point of this post, I am here to tell you today that we shouldn’t be paying high income taxes.

Your response: Duh… we all know that one.

My response: Everyone generally agrees on that point, except for the oddball who would claim that they are willing to sacrifice a rather substantial chunk of their annual income for the rest of Canada. I am not saying that I wouldn’t, nor am I stating that everyone else is selfish. I am saying that as much as we all believe in the Canadian way of equalization payments and a social safety net with health care for all and so on, I think taxing income is not the way to go.

Your response: Okay, so what’s your point?

My response: Growing up, I had to endure my dad’s ever-constant lectures about economics and business. Getting into university, I endured a never-ending wave of teachings revolving around our Canadian “philosophy” or “ideology”. Up to this day, we continue to hate the GST even though it literally saved our country from an eternal deficit, yet we merely wave a fist at Revenue Canada (oh sorry…the politicians now call it the Canada Revenue Agency) who takes away a chunk of our income. This year, I estimate they’ll take away at least $—-, give or take a couple digits. Now think of what you could do (or for that matter, what I could do) with that money.

Your response: Yeah well, so what?

My response: So what? The money that we would have in our so-called pockets could either be re-invested, put aside to savings or put to good use in the economy. That would in turn create a very good effect. Now let’s re-examine this situation but since income taxes would be lowered to a much lesser percentage, this ultimately means a great amount of income for people to make use of (and survive off of…). To fund all of those public programs that we hold dear to our Canadian way, we would apply a flat tax percentage across all products (goods and services), with the exception of any food item purchased from a grocery store. By doing so, those who consume more, will essentially pay more taxes.

Your response: You’re crazy, where’s the logic or reasoning in that?

My response: There is plenty of logic and reason behind a consumption tax. Income taxes that simply use an income bracket to take off chunks of income, hoping to cash in on the wealthy, is actually flawed. There is really only so much money you can take off of someone’s income. Why is a consumption tax practical? Here’re three reasons why:

  1. People regardless of who they are will pay the same tax percentage. What differs is based on the value of the product they purchase, rather than using an income bracket to determine the tax percentage. This is where it is actually fair for everyone regardless of how much money one makes. Ironically, this has the possibility of creating a win-win-win situation for people concerned about the social network, tax payers in general, and the government.
  2. By having people, organizations and businesses pay the proper proportion of taxes for every item that they purchase, there is an actual residual effect within the economic and social policy for the government or for that matter, the world. Think about it. For every product that we purchase, we are consuming something from this planet. For every computer, car, desk, chair, air conditioner, bottle of wine that we spend our money on; there are residual effects. The car is the simplest example because it DOES pollute, it is involved in numerous hit and runs, it requires paved roads and it involves the financial industry (insurance companies), etc. The tax revenue collected from this would be greater than the income tax formula that Canada continues to use currently.
  3. When does the government collect income tax? Once a year. When is sales tax collected? Every time you or I purchase something or pay for a service. Not to mention, you get to choose where your taxes are coming from.

So as the fiscal year comes to end and the taxman is coming to your doorstep to grab a portion of your annual fortune, perhaps it is time to pay attention to our country’s gold mine: you, me and the other persons that we know. I am not declaring that sales tax is the ultimate solution to our problems, but it is time that we lose the perception that sales tax is bad, because regardless of whether you’re a thrifty individual or a shopaholic, it works for both kinds of people (as well as people in between the two extremes). With the former you have more money to save and invest, and with the latter you have more money which equals more buying power.

Your response:  Aren’t you overlooking a lot of vital and important factors such as inflation and other cycles in the economy?

My response:  I’m not overlooking them.  I do agree that my overview isn’t absolute, but I am simply pointing out that moving from an income-tax-dependent revenue over to a more (not totally dropping income tax here) sales tax oriented funding system would be beneficial to everyone.

Pennies and Change

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