This remind you of anyone?
- Thread starter sjh
- Start date
I Am Jacks Damaged Box
***** Club Member (can't talk about it)
Good find. The rigged monopoly game was very interesting.
overflowed
Well-Known Member
Bravo. I read about this study but never saw this news reel. Very insightful. Does very much remind me of a certain entity trying to run us all over.
MrFedEx
Engorged Member
I need more clues. Does this entity smell like brimstone, behave like a weasel, and hail from Memphis?
Cactus
Just telling it like it is
And lies to employees like there's no tomorrow.
It reminds me of me, but I don't feel bad about it. Look what they do. If I'm in the prestigious and very, very rich Berkley College and they offer me candy that is going to be for kids in another study, why not take some? It's easily replaced. If they sit me down for a rigged game of Monopoly and I win, of course I "deserved to win". I didn't make the rules. And if I'm the one to set up to lose, it's obvious why I lost. It isn't because I'm good or bad, it's how the game is rigged. So if you're going to take anything from this, it isn't that "rich" people are somehow evil, it's that the system is rigged. Don't ask me to feel bad because this is what America has come to. Vote and become active to change the system.
hypo hanna
Well-Known Member
Its a simple game for a man with no conscience, no ethics.
"This is what America has come to" is a lazy man's excuse. The video is about morals and behavior, neither of which need to change as your income increases. So why does it?
Far simpler for one to complain about her circumstances than to take action to change them.
hypo hanna
Well-Known Member
Who says I'm not taking actions to change my circumstances? I have made many changes to stretch my ever shrinking paycheck. I have applied at a dozen or more companies and I make it a point to Work As Directed at FedEx until I can leave. At my age, no one appears interested in hiring me so I may be stuck here for the foreseeable future. I still have the commitments of a mortgage and my kids education. I post here not so much to complain but to warn others of the decietful manner in which FedEx operates.
Because the morals haven't changed. The perception has changed. I noticed this about going to gambling boats. I don't gamble for many reasons, but one of them is that the reward isn't all that enticing. $5,000 would be nice, but it's nothing in the big scheme of things. it doesn't even begin to pay down my considerable debt. Even that debt is a matter of perception. I probably owe $40,000 on credit cards alone. That number seems astronomical to some, but if I'm paying $2500 per month on them, it's not all that insurmountable.
So where is the ethics in the rigged Monopoly game? I'm sitting there playing, the professors doing the experiment have set the rules. I am playing by their rules. My perception, the one that they have defined, is that if I (the rigged winner) were to insist that the other "player" be on a level playing per traditional rules, for the purpose of their experiment I would be cheating. Odd, isn't it? It's the same with the tax code. You don't HAVE to take the mortgage interest deduction, but it's a rare homeowner who won't. Is that an ethical breakdown in a country burdened with debt? Of course not. Why not? Because the perception is that taking that deduction is well within the rules. The dollar amount is not even the point. Apple had itself in some ugly PR not long ago for the very same thing. Are they unethical or is the system rigged? The system is rigged. Or is it the absurd assertion that Apple and other companies should forgo such benefits just because they can? Should they just be "nice"?
Now what is abundantly clear is that the rich are afforded far more and vastly more lucrative opportunities to profit from the system. But to say that is a breakdown of personal ethics is simply a false conclusion. Only taking $100 when you pass go instead of taking $200 when you are allowed to doesn't make you a better or more ethical person.
Congratulations. But what I said was that it's easier to complain here than doing the other things, not that you hadn't done other things.
CJinx
Well-Known Member
I saw something just like the guy trying to cross the street yesterday. I was driving home from work and had pulled into a left turn lane at a stoplight behind an SUV which was behind two cars.. A couple adults and like 30 kids were on the sidewalk to the left of us, waiting to cross the street to the opposite side (diagonally left from us). Their "crosswalk" light came on telling them to cross at the same time that our turn signal went green. The guy at the front pulled forward into the intersection and stopped while the adults and the children crossed, and our light went yellow and red before they all finished. As the light had turned yellow, I could see the guy in the SUV flipping out and throwing his hands everywhere. The first guy continued through as he was already in the intersection when the light changed, the second guy ran the red light, as did the SUV which almost hit cross traffic which now had the green light and the right of way.
All that stress and almost getting into what would definitely be an at fault accident over a light that would have been green again in 30-40 seconds at worst. Why? Because he feels entitled? He drives a nice car? Or he's just an *******? Who knows.
All that stress and almost getting into what would definitely be an at fault accident over a light that would have been green again in 30-40 seconds at worst. Why? Because he feels entitled? He drives a nice car? Or he's just an *******? Who knows.
Huh? What? No, the monopoly game wasn't about ethics - it was about behavior. It was about how people started to act when they knew they were ahead of the game. I've seen it happen with my own sister and her husband. He got a job with a very well known social media site and suddenly he's driving in the carpool lane alone because he values his time more than a ticket or the law, and she figured out a very clever way to return a shirt she had washed and worn, despite the store's known policy against that. They're very very critical of restaurant food and I've never eaten out with them without them sending food back or complaining. Big adjustment in their mindset since they came into "money."
Your homeowner tax deduction is a pretty bad analogy. Our country's debt problem has nothing to do with people buying homes. People aren't filling out their taxes then turning around and playing the part of an elitist because they got a tax deduction. However, the study indicates that behavior in people is often dictated by their income. When people are suddenly treated as 'more important than' or 'rich' they begin to treat others as less than. You can't deny that. If you want to explain it off as "perception" (???), then do so, but in my opinion, it just makes you sound cocky and arrogant. But I'm guessing you don't care.
well, sjh, is it about ethics (morals) or not? Seems you want to separate morals from behavior now. And the analogy is perfect with any tax deduction. But when we use one such as the homeowners deduction, it hits too close to home (so to speak) and people view it differently. How is it fair for people who can't afford to buy a home? It isn't. But it doesn't matter because it is part of the tax code that people will take advantage of. We look at companies large and small that "game the system" and question their ethics and behavior while we as a society make the rules that clearly permit the behavior if not encourag it. Not about ethics? Are you sure about that? We tell them the action or behavior is acceptable but then berate their ethics when they display the behavior? And you see no disconnect? I may well be arrogant, but from what I can tell, your argument is disingenuous at best.
Forgive my confusion. The "rich" people did nothing morally wrong when they were given the advantage in the monopoly game. However, they behaved in a different way than the person at a disadvantage. The game was about behavior, not ethics. The video, as a whole, addressed both points though - behavior and morals. It's illegal to drive through a crosswalk when people are waiting to cross, and their study found that more expensive cars did it with more frequency than cheaper cars. That was a moral issue. See the difference yet?
There is nothing wrong or illegal about taking a tax deduction for interest paid on a mortgage. It's not a loophole, or a game someone is taking advantage of. As someone who doesn't own a house, I have no issues with those who do own a house and take this deduction. What about people who don't make much money and the government gives them a few thousand dollars simply because? Is that unfair? I have no issues with a company who pays themselves more than their employees. What's the motivation for being bigger and better, and working harder? I'm not sure where I've ever stated having money is bad. And this video wasn't about how being rich is bad. It's about how money can affect behavior. I don't think it's necessary to treat poorer people with disdain simply because you have more money, or to start breaking rules when you get there. How mortgage interest deductions figure into this, I'm still trying to figure that out.
