Watching a documentary, there was aremark from the journalist on how, due to how wildly taxation on goods may vary, from area to area, in the US, most retailers do not put the full prices on the shelves and instead just tally it at checkout.
This made no sense to me, a european, as when I go to any regular shop, prices already include all taxes applicable to the product.
There are specialty stores where VAT and other taxes may not be applied on the price on the shelf but those are usually wholesellers, selling for professionals, that already know what additional taxes will be added and at which rates, at checkout.
Not having the full price you’ll be paying, on display, seems very underhanded and a bad practice. The client should know how much they are going to pay from the moment they pick an item.
The whole argument of “it’s cause there’s so much variation in tax amount” never really made sense to me as an excuse. Like… you’d print the labels at the store wouldn’t you? So you just put the tax amount in the system for that store and print it… the only way it makes sense is if for some reason you’re shipping price tags across the country
Its so they can advertise a lower price.
There are often nation-wide or region-wide advertising campaigns that proudly display a price. If individual cities have different sales taxes, that would make it hard. Personally, I still don’t find this to be a good reason. Just charge a single amount anyway and eat the costs in the high tax area. Price it in.
Edit: now that I’m thinking about it, many chain businesses are franchised. So each McDonald’s (for example) is independently owned. So they couldn’t just eat the cost in those areas.
When you say “people” you’re really talking about the stores, right? The stores just put the price they charge, not the taxes which they don’t get. Yes, taxes vary from state to state, but it’s not like we’re all going to different states every day. I know what the tax rate is in my area, and so I know to add that when I see a price in a store.
If you really mean “people” as in customers, it depends. If I’m telling someone that a store has a good price, I’ll just quote the store’s price. But sometimes when I’m talking about what I paid, I’ll include everything “Wow, I can’t believe this cart of groceries was $150…”
Why do consumers accept a system like this? Wouldn’t it be just better for consumers if the shop pricetag represented the exact amount you have to pay at the counter?
Sure, sounds nice. But is it bad enough that people feel compelled to create a ballot measure and get it changed? Apparently not.
Yeah apparently so. I guess it’s not the top of mind problem Americans have right now.
Over here various pro-consumer watchdog organisations would protest wildly and the merchant would most likely get fined for false advertising. So the whole thing feels a bit alien to me.
Sure if we started the whole tax thing today we may do it different. But it’s culture created over time. Our sales taxes all started during and shortly after the Great Depression in the 1920s. I’m sure store owners likely preferred people realize what they were charging vs the govts take. This is why I like it now. It’s very clear what the govt is taking and what the store is charging. It doesn’t bug me at all to have it added on at the register. It’s all I’ve known for 40 years. Currently I even live in a state with no sales tax (recently moved here), but I’m in a small tourist town that implemented a “resort sales tax” of 1% to help pay for city services related to tourism.
I think there’s also a fundamental cultural difference in that “govts take”. We don’t normally see taxes as “taking” in that sense, but I fully understand where you’re coming from - it makes sense and seems to work for you guys.
I guess it’s not the top of mind problem Americans have right now.
You’ve got that right!
Only an American would assume that when someone says people they mean companies instead of, you know, people. 🤦♂️
I assumed that because of his wording. People I know don’t really “name prices,” businesses do. My guess was that it was the businesses that he meant, and since it was responses about businesses that he replied to, I think I was right. But, in case, I answered for regular people, too. Don’t know why you have to be shitty about it.
We just think about the base price, but the taxes. Then at checkout you’re told “oh, that number you had in your head? Add 5-20% more as a surprise”
It’s a terrible system, very anti consumer. You never get used to it
Oh, and it also has the fun side effect of making sure nothing ends on a dollar amount
Usually people talk about the pre tax cost.
I have a tinfoil hat theory that the taxes are kept like that to give people a recurring, low grade, anti-tax sentiment. There are a lot of crazy idiots that don’t want government to exist here, so by making people feel bad about paying taxes (instead of obscuring that by baking it into the listed price) they can win sympathy.
Take the hat off. Weirder theories exist.
We don’t include the tax. You just expect what you pay at the till to be some percent more than the sum of shelf prices. It’s a known number, 5% where I live except on a few untaxed items (which I should mention isn’t the US, just nearby).
An extra six percent isn’t really the difference between a big purchase and a small one, so it’s pretty much just background noise for me. I know to leave some wiggle room if my budget is tight but don’t make the effort to calculate my technical maximum. Worst case scenario I get one less item than I planned.
We did a trip to the US that covered coast to coast by plane and then 5000k of driving back to the centre… And their pretend pricing sucked.
Every state we went to advertised a price, but what you actually paid varied by heaps.
Bought some clothes that were something like $700USD by the tag, and had $1000USD on hand… Which wasn’t enough once they rang it up! Wtf?
That’s just called being scammed. There’s no 43% sales tax anywhere in the US.
A lot of convenience stores around me don’t even have any prices shown on many items. Drives me crazy, but I guess many people are used to it? Sales tax is usually around 7% in most places I’ve been to, so if I know the price of an item, I know, roughly, what to expect.
No price means I won’t buy. Because it means probably 200% mark up at least
No prices? Things are getting worse.
Yeah, that’s crazy to me too. Never happens in
Canadamy area, unless somebody messed up when shelving things.I think that would actually be illegal here, since price advertising is very regulated. For example, you must be given the price displayed even if it’s an error.
I’ve been in a bunch of convenience stores in Ontario that don’t have prices on items. this has been going on for at least nearly 10 years.
I stand corrected.
Alberta then. I’ll fix it. I guess it must be legal.
As far as I can tell, once the question about price is asked, they will make a remark about how awful the Republicans or Democrats are (depending on their leanings).
Yeah, it’s shitty, but we also know it’s gonna happen. It’s not like it’s a surprise. Sometimes you might get a little extra sticker shock but it’s not as underhanded as it seems unless you’re very new to the process. The same way we tip, I just assume I’m gonna pay ~30% more than the price due to tax and tip.
I’ve also never had to budget so much that the specifics of the tax mattered to me, like I’ve never had to stretch money like that, so that could be part of it.
Ignore it.
Sometimes I am like egh, that’s annoying and more than I expected and then carry on with buying whatever it is. But that is a more recent thing, now that am being more frugal. For like a decade I would say I never acknowledged it or thought about it.
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