The Cost of Free

While enjoying our coffee this morning, the wife and I were listening to this podcast from NPR’s Planet Money.  There is a new podcast from Planet Money twice a week and we are a week or so behind.  I will not go into details about this particular podcast but I recommend listening to it as it is worth 20 minutes of your time.

The story looked into a short period of time when the Red Cross started to charge the US soldiers for doughnuts during WWII.  Despite the fact that they were told to do this by the US government and despite the fact that they protested before following orders, some veterans still hold the Red Cross in a bad light for this one thing that happened 70 years ago.  Toward the end of the podcast they talk to several economists about why this one thing has had a life of its own for so long.  One economist’s hypothesis focused on the concept of “free” and how the relationship changes between two parties when something goes from free to not free.

In one example of this hypothesis the economist asked us to assume how we would react to being asked by your mother to pay $10 after finishing Thanksgiving dinner.  You would not question that $10 was not a fair price for the meal but it would dynamically change your relationship with your mother from family member to service (for a fee) provider.  It would tarnish everything going forward and they way you interact with her would forever change.  This is what happened with the veterans and the Red Cross.  They way that the veterans viewed the Red Cross changed since their relationship went from one thing to another.

Now, with most things in life, my take away from listening to this was different than the wife’s.  She took away what most people took away, namely that companies have to be careful in dealing with their customers.  There are actions that are taken that, while they could be quickly reversed, would take years (or in the case of the Red Cross, decades) to repair.  Instead, I thought about how I might charge for things that I give away for free (like the mother in the example charging for Thanksgiving dinner).

For the most part, the rest of my immediate family (that is to say, the wife and kids) are very touchy / feely people.  They like physical contact, hugs, kisses, etc.  I am not against this but there are times when I prefer not to be touched (or for that matter near anyone).  Sometimes I don’t like it when someone, even my kids, just run up and hug me with no forewarning.  This probably sounds absurd to most of you but the kids have learned (for better or for worse) to announce first that they are going to hug me before diving in with the affection.  I know that some day I will look back on this issue of mine and know that I was in the wrong but for not it is what it is.  But this podcast got me thinking, what if I charged for hugs and kisses?

Come with me for a moment on this crazy thought.  My goal is to be happy and if my level of happiness is lowered by making others happy then I need to associate a cost for their happiness to compensate for my loss of happiness.  If I could set a price per hug then the child (or the wife) could decide if the happiness that they would get (by my hug) is worth the cost of that hug.  Since the kids only get so much for allowance then there would be a limit to how many hugs that I would have to give out.  I see my own veterans / Red Cross issue forming though.

I see several problems with this (besides the painfully obvious ones like me being seen as an unfit parent).  First, there are times when I am more inclined to give out hugs for a lower price or even free.  If I were to set a price for hugs then it would have to be a price that went up and down, probably on an hourly basis.  This would involve having to set up some sort of index that showed the current value / price of a hug.  Even if I could set this up, my kids, not being dummies, would probably just wait until the price was low (or free) and horde my hugs creating instability in the hug market.  Also, it is possible that they could simply get hugs from the other source (my wife) as she would undercut me in this market and cut my profits (it is hard to compete with free).  Oh, I could market my hugs as being “worth it” or “higher quality” than her hugs, but that would involve work as well not to mention having to give out free samples to prove my claims.  The market might just decide to put me out of business.  What would I do then if I needed / wanted a hug?

So, as you might imagine, I have decided not to implement this “pay for hugs” program in my household.  A special note to the wife.  Honey, you know those times when I am staring off into space deep in thought and you ask me what I am thinking?  And you now how I almost always answer, “Oh, nothing.” or “You don’t want to know.”?  Well, this morning was one of those times.  It is a dangerous thing sometimes to ask me what is on my mind.

Jon

The Anxiety of Lateness in Dreams

I blogged about 6 years ago about a dream that I had.  Since then I have had plenty of dreams I am sure but none that I decided to blog about; until now that is.

Sometime in the past week I had dreams on consecutive nights that had the general theme of being late for something.  I remember after waking up after the second dream thinking that I really should blog about these.  Here are the dreams.

• Dream 1: I was in a house that is unknown to me in the real world but I was familiar enough with it in my dream that I knew where things were at inside the house.  For some reason I had some friends over.  These were friends that I had in my high school days so I knew them.  For some reason not explained in the dream, we got home very late and because of this we slept in later than normal.  We had to leave to get somewhere by 8 AM and I had just awoken at 7:30 and I was taking a shower.  The water pressure was horrible so the shower was taking longer than normal.  To complicate matters, I had longer hair and the water pressure was not allowing me to rinse the shampoo / conditioner out of my hair.  I was very frustrated at the water pressure, my choice to have long hair, my sleeping in and the whole situation in general.  I woke up before I got out of the shower
• Dream 2: I was in our current house here in McKinney as far as I could tell.  We were late getting out of the door to go somewhere (church maybe?) and we were trying to get the dogs put up into their cages.  The dog we were having trouble with was not known to me in the real world but in the dream it was our dog.  After failing to round up the dog and due to our lateness we decided to leave the dog to roam the house out of its cage while we were out.  As I closed the door and was locking it with my house key I noticed that the dog was now in the yard.  Somehow we got the dog back into the house but we were all the more later for it.  Finally I went to turn the key on the front door and the door came off of its top hinge.  I was very frustrated with the dog, its behavior, my front door and the whole situation in general.  I woke up right as I was trying to get investigate how long it would take to get the door back on its hinges.

For several minutes after I woke up after both of these dreams I was still anxious.  In real life, as in the dreams, I hate being late.  Before I was married and especially before I had kids (and dogs) I tried to be early to everything.  I remember showing up for youth bowling league on Saturday mornings right when the bowling center opened (about 30 minutes before the league started).  The jobs that I had early in life all had working hours with a start time when I was expected to arrive and clock into work.  After I had a job that was no longer hourly and one that had a more flexible schedule I relaxed a bit but there there still things that had starting times (church for example).  Most recently I just try focus on my being ready to go and I let the wife worry about her being ready.  When I am ready to leave for church for example, rather than bellow out the current time like it was a public service that I was tasked to provide,  I just sit in a chair and (dare I say “patiently”) wait.  I purposely sit in a chair with no view of the clock.  Since I do not wear a watch or bring my cell phone with me to church, I have no way of knowing what time it is until we all get into the car.  I would wager that if you ask my wife if I was getting better about my anxiety of lateness she would agree but these dreams brought all those early year’s feelings back.  It is still a struggle not to worry unnecessarily about being late and these dreams have made me to consider working harder on keeping calm.  It is strange what your mind focuses on when you dream really as I have not felt this bad about lateness in more than 10 years.

Just like in my original blog from 6 years ago, let’s visit http://dreammoods.com and see what they interpret my dream as meaning…

• Late: To dream that you are late signifies your fear of change and your ambivalence about seizing an opportunity. You may feel unready, unworthy, or unsupported in your current circumstances. Additionally, you may be overwhelmed or conflicted with decisions about your future. Time is running out and you no longer have time to accomplish all the things you want. Alternatively, being late in your dream could be telling you that it is better late than never.

Interesting.  I do have a new manager at work and he does have a slightly different workload that he wants me to focus on than what I have on my plate now.  Also, I have been thinking more about my future retirement and whether or not I am putting enough into 401k’s and IRA’s.  Also, there are a few things that I would like to start doing (similar to me starting running a few months ago).  Maybe there is something to this dream interpretation thing!

• Door: To dream that you are locking the door suggests that you are closing yourself off from others. You are hesitant in letting others in and revealing your feelings. It is indicative of some fear and low self-worth.
• Shower: To dream that you are taking a shower in clear, fresh water symbolizes spiritual or physical renewal and forgiveness. You are washing the burdens out of your life

Either one of these things may or may not be true, I am not sure.  I was not really successful in either dream in accomplishing the task (completing the shower or locking the door) so I am not sure what that could mean.  Maybe I will have more dreams this week.  I will be sure to let you know.

Jon

Choosing Ignorance For Others

I was reminded recently that ignorance truly is bliss.  I have always known (to some extent) that what is seen cannot be unseen (just google “human centipede” if you don’t believe me [note: please do not google “human centipede”, trust me on this one!]).  For this blog I will focus more on “what is known cannot be unknown”.

Information is powerful.  We live in a great time in history as we are normally only a few clicks away from getting information on almost anything (I have personally lost [what seems like] a year of my life to Wikipedia).  Fortunately or unfortunately, with knowledge comes responsibility.  Once you know something, you have to choose whether or not to act on it.  You might have to change (ouch!).  You might even feel compelled to share your knowledge with others.  That would mean that those others will have to choose whether or not to act on this knowledge.  Most things you learn are not that important but every once in a while you learn something that is important, something that you feel compelled to share.  Information of this type is so important that not sharing would be potentially dangerous or disastrous and if others knew that you knew this information and knew that you chose NOT to share it then they might be upset with (or mad at) you.

At a very high level, being a salesman is just conveying new information.  You build your case for your product by explaining (or skewing) various facts about your product (or your competitor’s product) and hope that this knowledge transfer will convince your prey (this is a strong word but it applies most of the time) to take action on this newly dispersed knowledge.  For the most part religion works this way as well.  With religion, especially evangelical denominations, not sharing your information and knowledge is frowned upon (and a sin [resulting in guilt]).  This brings me to my main point of this blog, guilt and the role it plays in making us act upon new, important information.

Recently I was invited to a friend’s house for a “free dinner”.  This should have raised a flag immediately but honestly it was the wife that was invited and I was merely (as I found out later) needed to help the host qualify for a free gift.  The whole evening was a sales pitch for Saladmaster cooking systems.  There were 3 couples present (if you count the hosts) and 2 single folks (for a total of 8 of us).  We started around 6 PM and we did not get home until close to 10 PM.  While the meal was good, it did not take us 4 hours to eat so the balance of the time was filled with the sales pitch.  The evening was initially presented as a “no pressure” event.  I can almost agree with that statement depending on how you define “pressure”.  It was not, however, a “no guilt” event.

Let me start with an obvious fact: Saladmaster products are extremely, horrendously expensive. They are not ashamed of this fact and do not take any great pains to hide it.  They led with this information in fact and then began, over the next 3+ hours, to explain why an investment in their products is worth it.  The Saladmaster representative admitted to reading from / following a script.  She has some personal stories to tell from her home life and also from others that she had sold this product to during dinners just like this one.  All the shared information was meant not only to force us to make a decision, but to appear ignorant if we did not make the (in their eyes) obvious decision; namely to purchase their product.

The main points that were made during the pitch revolved around things that you could measure (return on investment in lower grocery bills and medical bills) and things that you could not put a price on (better tasting food and your long term health as well as the health of your immediate family).  Now, I can appreciate a good ROI (return on investment) sales pitch.  You take your initial cost and compare it to some future savings to determine when you will break even.  They had great information showing you ROI based solely on lowering your grocery bill by 20% – 30%.  Depending on the amount of product you would buy and your current spending habits on groceries, your ROI was anywhere from 1 to 3 years (with some extreme cases going out further).  If you throw in the fact that your health would increase and result in less doctor’s visits then the ROI might be shorter (I have not personally had to go to a doctor in several years so this is not really a savings for me).  I also appreciated the taste of the food that was served (the food was non organic but had all the flavor of organic foods – the sales pitch was NOT to stop buying organic food, just that the food you have would taste better when cooked in their product – and I concur that it did).  What I did not appreciate was the heaping helpings of guilt that they kept serving throughout the evening.

During the entire evening we were asked questions like “Isn’t it worth it (to buy this product) for your children’s health?” and “Studies have shone that (insert bad thing from the cookware that we use at home) have been linked to (insert appropriately dangerously sounding horrific disease here) and wouldn’t you pay just about anything to spare your loved ones from this?”  She referenced study after study (the origins of which were in the fine print on a banner too small and too far away for me to read) that their product was rated highest in this or that and that this or that group endorsed their product.  She referenced past law suits against competitors (like Dupont who makes Teflon) and how they supposedly covered up the dangers of their competing products.  Time after time they kept hammering away.  They made some crazy claims like a woman who tested so high in iron (from using bad pots and pans) that she was banned from a computer lab after merely entering the room destroyed 33 computers (of course after a month using Saladmaster she was allowed back in with no damage done to the new computers).  If you assumed that everything stated was true you either 1) wrote a very large check / whipped out your credit card or (at a minimum) 2) swore off using your current cookware and converted to a diet mostly consisting of raw items.

Mercifully the evening came to an end but not after it was suggested that we also consider hosting a “free dinner” for our friends so we could share this wonderful information and allow them to invest in this product that (let’s face it) is worth every penny and you would be (at a minimum) doing a disservice to your loves ones if you did not buy it.  Of course if you host a party (or two or three) you would get wonderful free hosting gifts.  I knew two things heading into the evening.  First, I knew I was not going to purchase though this would involve having to be the “heavy” with my wife in front of friends and the salesperson.  Second, I knew that the discussion would not end at the event and would carry on back at my house that night and onto the next day.  This “free dinner’s” cost would really add up in the long run.

Now, let me really get to the reason why I am writing this blog.  For purposes of this discussion let’s  assume that everything that was said during the sales pitch was true.  What is my responsibility to my friends?  Am I doing them a disservice by NOT telling them about this product (that is to say, host a free dinner)?  I actually gave this a great deal of thought and have decided against hosting a party.  Here is my reasoning: they are not going to buy this product for either 1 of 2 reasons…

• They cannot afford (at this time) to make the necessary financial investment
• They know that (based on their lifestyle) they would not use the product (to put it simply, they cook very little at home and are not interested in changing that lifestyle)

Since they would not be purchasing then the only thing that they would get from all of this is a free meal and a certain level of guilt.  This guilt (depending on their ability to bear it) would at worst cause them to feel bad whenever they ate or (worse) when they fed their children.  This guilt would at a minimum lower the enjoyment of any meal they ever ate again that was not made with these products.  Now, is it my responsibility to MAKE them decide or should I simply (out of friendship) NOT share this information and spare them the guilt / loss of enjoyment of life.  Would they be mad at me if they were invited to a free dinner by another friend and then discovered that I chose not to share this with them when I had the chance?  It is my call to withhold information but I have watched enough crime dramas on TV to think that this might be a punishable offence, no matter my good intentions.

My choice is made (pending any further arguments put forth by the wife) but I cannot help but feel a little guilty for not telling them.  Guilt upon guilt!  Remind me to “thank” my “friends” who invited me to this “free (of pressure but not of guilt) dinner”.

Jon