Gender discrimination in pricing

[Duke87 1,070]

Things cost more for women.

My take on this, personally, is that it's just the old philosophy of "what the market will bear" at work. And that, for whatever reason, women are willing to pay a higher price for things. Or perhaps simply less inclined to pay attention to the price tag.

The article does bring up an interesting issue, though.

[Easy Bakes 253]

Things cost more for women.

My take on this, personally, is that it's just the old philosophy of "what the market will bear" at work. And that, for whatever reason, women are willing to pay a higher price for things. Or perhaps simply less inclined to pay attention to the price tag.

Think you hit the nail on the head there.

*prepares self for onslaught *

[Ocram's Razr 963]

Women care more about personal appearance so they are more likely to pay a premium.

[Meg 368]

Things cost more for women.

My take on this, personally, is that it's just the old philosophy of "what the market will bear" at work. And that, for whatever reason, women are willing to pay a higher price for things. Or perhaps simply less inclined to pay attention to the price tag.

Think you hit the nail on the head there.

*prepares self for onslaught *

Depends on what the items being purchased and what the fall-out would be.

The whole shirt / blouse thing at the cleaners is nothing new. One of my female co-workers wore men's shirts in protest

There are some jobs where that just does not fly.

Women care more about personal appearance so they are more likely to pay a premium.

Women's perceived worth is directly tied to personal appearance. Men's personal appearance, not so much.

As the article says

And if you compare it with all the problems women face, it's certainly not in the top one, three, even five.

This is true.

[hym 358]

The article inspires a range of thoughts, some potentially more useful than others.

1. If we're talking an article of clothing that has to be dry cleaned, I can see a need to send it to the cleaners. Otherwise, it seems to me that the only person you have to blame for the prices you pay at the cleaners is yourself.
   
2. While I understand that the connection between appearance and personal worth helps fuel the drive for women's beauty products, the high prices issue is partially self-inflicted. I've seen women's deodorant that is cheaper than the stuff men typically buy, and from the looks of it, the stuff never gets bought. Who wants to sell their product for $2 when everyone is willing to pay $5 for it? Hair conditioner is a similar issue. Many of my female friends have told me, at one time or another, that I should condition my hair. I flatly refuse to spend extra money for hair conditioner products. (Full disclosure: My current shampoo allegedly has a hair conditioner in it, but I only buy it because I haven't found a suitable shampoo for less money.)
   
3. As the article mentioned, research has indicated that men and women can have very different buying habits. Men are more likely to negotiate pricing than women, and women are more likely to spend extra money for higher quality service. Both of which mean that women will likely spend more money to acquire the same goods/services than men will.
   
4. The article makes zero significant mention of the fact that gender-based pricing can work for women too. Life insurance and vehicle insurance are two such examples.
   

[Mary Maurine Mayo 984]

I personaly pay attention to the price tag on clothes shoes ect.

Where someone would spend lets say 20 bux on a dress I would not buy it.

But that is my personal pref.

Like meg said it depends on the product and the quality. For example i recently went through five different brands of shampoo and conditioner to find a cheaper one. I ended up back where i started.

[A Nonny Moose 8,261]

The worst of it all with personal products like soaps and shampoos is that there don't seem to be any decent samples any more. You have to purchase a full, if small, quantity in order to ascertain quality by test.

[Easy Bakes 253]

The worst of it all with personal products like soaps and shampoos is that there don't seem to be any decent samples any more. You have to purchase a full, if small, quantity in order to ascertain quality by test.

And then when you find one they stop making it 6 months later

That's why i use Johnson's Baby shampoo we will be in whole lot of trouble if they stop making that stuff.

.

[Mary Maurine Mayo 984]

I use Dove shampoo and conditioner it seems to be the only one I can use. It is one of the best products.

Most of my shopping is done at resale shops including school books.

[Duke87 1,070]

The whole shirt / blouse thing at the cleaners is nothing new. One of my female co-workers wore men's shirts in protest

There are some jobs where that just does not fly.

The thing of it is, "blouse" could mean any number of different things. Some blouses are simple and really not more difficult than men's shirts to handle. Some are very frilly and fancy and can easily take twice as long to iron. But the folks at the cleaners can't really say "well, we'll give you the men's price for simple blouses", so they just charge all women's shirts more knowing that on average they will cost more to clean. Some feminists will of course see this as an insult but they fail to see the whole picture when they do.

The point of women spending more effort (and thus more money) on looking nice is perhaps valid to some degree, although it's hardly universal. I know some guys who place high value on looking nice - a guy on my softball team almost missed a game once because he insisted he needed to go get a haircut since it had been over two weeks since he'd gone last and it was getting sloppy (his hair is buzzed military short and it would take at least a couple months for it to get "sloppy"). It wasn't until the rest of us all started giving him crap about this that he backed down. We still give him crap about it.

And then on the other hand I know some girls who keep it simple and are low maintenance. My ex-girlfriend stopped doing her hair after our third date, stopped wearing makeup after our fourth, and in general never did either unless it was a special occasion. My best friend usually doesn't do much of either, either.

Of course, there are some ways of going low maintenance which aren't practical for everyone. I avoid having to comb my hair or do much of anything with it by keeping it buzzed short. I avoid having to go to the dry cleaners by not wearing clothes that require it. I avoid having to iron shirts by hanging them up while they're still warm, spraying them with wrinkle releaser, and.wearing shirts made of low-wrinkle fabric. I minimize the amount of shaving I have to do by growing a beard. But, no woman can reasonably keep her hair that short, and no woman can get away with not shaving. Avoiding the cleaners may be possible for most women, but avoiding the iron is not without keeping your wardrobe real simple. Nor is avoiding having delicates that need to be washed separately.