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Asklemmy @lemmy.ml

_number8_ @lemmy.world

2y ago

Why is everything in consumer / American life so fucking shitty now - and companies literally just say 'oh bc profit margins' and we're now expected to swallow that and sympathize?

like I went to taco bell and they didn't even have napkins out. they had the other stuff just no napkins, I assume because some fucking ghoul noticed people liked taking them for their cars so now we just don't get napkins! so they can save $100 per quarter rather than provide the barest minimum quality of life features.

319 comments

That’s the end result of a capitalist system once corporations have superseded governments in power. It will only get worse.
- Yeah, we may be at checkmate. Unlike the end of the age of the robber barons, when we reformed capitalism in the late 1800s / early 1900s in the US... this time the capitalists have purchased enough politicians to stop reform completely and forever.
  
  What's funny is that this is entirely unsustainable. If they were in any way a real "capitalist" they would realize that the creeping authoritarianism they're pushing destroys economies long-term. They're laughing all the way to the bank right now because they're not concerned with the future.
  However, they should be, because this House of Cards can easily collapse with the right push. They literally can't see past the profits at the end of the next quarter.
  They literally can't imagine that all of them choosing to undermine capitalist principles at the same time will result in capitalism failing completely. The only reason it even functioned as well as it did for so long was 1. regulation and 2. raping the third world for resources.
  I mean, I'm a fucking leftist, and it makes me feel like I'm taking crazy pills that things are so far gone that I'm actually arguing "if we're going to do capitalism, we may as well do it in a way that it actually functions properly" as if that is a fucking fringe idea here.
  The wheels are about to fly off this fuckin turkey.
  
  Uh, didn't the rich rather famously buy political influence back then as well?
  
  Hey man, the FTC is doing anti-trust like nobody's business for the first time since gods-know-when. It's not a silver bullet, but it's progress for the first time in forever!
  
  Time to sharpen the guillotines again..
- Only 45 upvotes, Lemmy be slipping.
  
  We're slowly hemorrhaging users. Pretty much all of us upvoted it.
- I mean, hypothetically. That is the end result of the neoliberal, or late capitalism economic philosophy if applied on a model. But economic systems in practice are never the philosophy, and are only there in the first place to support the governance of a nation state. I spend half my time in Italy, for example, where the laws protect both the big international brands and the mom and pop shops.
  My point is that we are the citizens that make up the government that designs the governance rules for our nation-state. Capitalism is not a government, or people, or the entire story when it comes to commerce and trade systems. We can shape it and use it, like any other framework.
  Likewise, regardless of your economic system, greedy people will try to accumulate power, bend the rules to benefit themselves, and extend those benefits across borders if they can. Powerful egos will warp people and rules around them like gravity. All governance systems that strive to be just, collaborative and promote the quality of life of all its citizens have to both put strong rules in place to check the power-hungry, and constantly monitor and adapt to keep them in check.
  
  "...we are the citizens that make up the government that designs the governance rules for our nation-state."
  No we're not. We only have the illusion of control where we are allowed to vote on how to tinker with the outer edges of a system that is in reality controlled by 0.1% of the population.
- Certainly the end result of financialised capital.
You load 16 tons, what do you get?
Another day older and deeper in debt
St. Peter, don't you call me 'cause I can't go
I owe my soul to the company store
- Much as I love that song, it doesn't really apply to the OP question, which is more about companies exploiting their customers rather than their workers.
  
  Workers are consumers.
  
  I think what this comment is trying to say is that we're headed towards an age that resembles what that song talks about: An age of unfettered capitalism, with a small number of corporation owning so much of the market that they can do what they want with no repercussions.
  
  the song was about company towns where the laborers were paid in store credit instead of wages. you'd work, but never pay off debts, since it all went back to the companies who set the prices for everything you buy, and so they were able to keep you on a tight leash.
  That's how it feels like things are going now. a few companies own everything, pay our wages, and set our prices. we cannot get ahead.
  
  16 napkins
- I love Joe Vs. The Volcano (where this song is featured) because it really encapsulates the idea of the song.
Because stocks kept trading at higher and higher P/E ratios essentially saying "the market thinks this company can make much more money in the future than they are making now."
The problem is, most companies couldn't, and as we have hit a recessionary phase those companies are now scrambling to try to show continued growth justifying their price.
The way they do that is by cutting off their limbs and selling them for short term cash at long term consequence.
So you see them cutting costs in all kinds of ways that screw over their customers but can show quarterly profits. Even though it means customers may not stay customers if better options appear.
So we are in this sort of pendulum swing period where large corporations suck because there's effectively no competition that doesn't and sucking is the last way for them to squeeze water from a stone. The natural solution is that we'd see competition rise up that doesn't suck to take their customers away and force pro-customer changes.
This likely will eventually happen, but it's going to take time. There are emerging tech trends that will accelerate it, but are still a few years away from practically changing the equation.
In about a decade things should suck less, and a number of the crappy companies around right now may no longer be around, but in the meantime it's still going to suck for a while yet as things adjust to the dying of the old guard and birth of the new.
- I don't really agree with this. It is the answer that I think classical economics would give but I just don't think it's useful. For one, it ignores politics. Large corporations also have bought our government, and a few large wealth management funds like vanguard own a de facto controlling share in many public companies, oftentimes including virtually an entire industry, such that competition between them isn't really incentived as much as financial shenanigans and other Jack Welch style shit.
  Some scholars (i think I read this in Adrienne bullers value of a whale, which is basically basis for this entire comment) even argue that we've reached a point where it might be more useful to think of our economy as a planned economy, but planned by finance instead of a state central authority.
  All that is to say: why would we expect competition to grow, as you suggest, when the current companies already won, and therefore have the power to crush competition? They've already dismantled so many of the antimonopoly and other regulations standing in their way. The classical economics argument treats these new better companies as just sorta rising out of the aether but in reality there's a whole political context that is probably worth considering.
  
  Good point well made. I think it's usually naive wishful thinking (for a "just world" that makes sense and is going to be OK, actually) that allows a liberal capitalist apologist to point to classical economics and say "see the companies are hurting," but the companies don't have feelings, and the owners and shareholders are feeling just fine.
- I disagree on your expectations for improvement, though agree on the rest.
  There are lots of markets with natural barriers to entry were there isn't any realistic chance for a new competitor to arrise and even if one did thanks to, say, some new technology, they'll almost certainly only "disrupt" until they became well established and then do the same as all the rest because that maximizes profitability (just look at Uber a decade ago and look at Uber now).
  Then there are lots of markets were crooked politcians (which nowadys seems to be most of the ones in the mainstream parties) make sure there are artificial barriers to entry so that well-connected companies are protected from competition - pretty much any market were an operating license is required, such as Banking and Mobile works like that - and that too means no costumer-friendly competitors will arrise in such markets, ever, because the gatekeeping which is in the hands of said crooked politians stops them before they even start, and said political gatekeepers couldn't care less about consumer-friendliness of market participants and they'll only change their ways if forced to politically and that's not going to happen in countries with voting systems designed to maintain a political duopoly such as the US were the politicians rarelly fear losing their positions, especially on complex hard to explain things like how consumers suffer from them "maintaing high artifical market barriers to entry"
  In the old days, before neoliberalism got entrenched, you might have such natural or artificial monopoly or cartel markets occupied by a Public company, which due to the lack of competition quickly grew inneficient (in my professional experience the same happens in Private companies in such a situation, by the way), though cheap, and on which there was often political pressure to improve. Now you have them occupied by Private companies who are driven solely by profit-seeking, so it's still shit (because they cut costs) only it's also expensive for customers rather than cheap (because they try to squeeze costumers with high prices) and suffers zero political pressure because the politicians hide behind the "It's a Free Market" to refuse to regulate whilst secretly waiting for their Non-executive board memberships as rewards for being "friends of business" - a wonderful example of all this are Railways in the UK.
- this sort of talk will get you killed in the revolution, fair warning.
  
  🙄
Huggies went up in price, but their cost of manufacturing actually went down.
It's got nothing to do with profit margins, it's just pure greed. Also, the law requires that publicly traded companies be greedy.
- Also, the law requires that publicly traded companies be greedy
  The law doesn't actually state you need screw over your customers and maximize profit. It says that executives have a fiduciary duty, which means they must act in the best interest of the shareholder, not themselves.
  That does not mean they have to suck out every single dollar of profit. Executives have some leeway in this and can very easily explain that napkins lead to happier customers and longer term retention which means long term profits.
  It's purely a short-term, wall street driven, behavior also driven by executive pay being also based in stock so they're incentivized to drive up the price over the next quarter so they can cash out.
  
  Yeah sure, but then you could also say the same about a private business. The CEO works for the business owner, whether the owner is private or public stockholders.
  But the reality is that publicly traded companies end up being far more greedy and profit driven than private businesses. In particular, the greedy private businesses tend to taget an IPO, while the more conscientious ones remain private.
- nothing to do with profit margins, it’s just pure greed
  ???
  
  Maybe I should have said "it's nothing to do with maintaining profit margins" against rising costs.
- Maybe not an exact law to be greedy but aren't they legally responsible for acting in the interest of the shareholders not the consumer
  
  Not technically a "law"...
  "The shareholder wealth maximization doctrine requires public corporations to pursue a single purpose to the exclusion of all others: increase the wealth of shareholders by increasing the value of their shares. However, a company should be committed to enhance shareholder value and comply with all regulations and laws that govern shareholder's rights."
  The" however... " part is largely ignored, except for when it benefits shareholders.
- Lack of competition against an embedded brand name. Change brands.
  
  The brands shuffle their designs to stay ahead of IP laws. Gillette made the definitive shaving razor in 1901, the patent subsequently expired and anyone could make it, now they make new razors every few years to stay ahead of the curve.
  With nappies, the correct answer is reusable nappies. It sounds gross, but when you're a parent you quickly learn to deal with all kinds of shit.
  You also get funky designs and stuff. The insides are interchangeable, the oustides are fashion.
Unregulated capitalism.
- I cant wait to be arrested for not noticing the napkin dispenser is empty fast enough
  
  there wasn't even a dispenser lol felt like i was going crazy
- const_void fighting the good fight at…checks notes… lack of napkins…….
- Yes... capitalism...and not consumers who just don't care.
  
  You’re gonna get a lot of downvotes but people really are too pacified by binge watching Survivor while scrolling through TikTok. People don’t get angry about the shit that matters, not when it’s much easier to be angrier about Star Wars not being good anymore.
  
  This is by far the biggest problem - most people don't put up with that shit and will publicly murder a company that tries it on.
  It's just this one country, you know, the one with the guns, that rolls over to get their bellies scratched when the billionaires come knocking
  
  Not even that, just a government that doesn't care.
  
  It's both lack of regulation and lack of consumer activism.
We've let our companies grow too large, giving them the ability to put the screws on us. Also competition isn't really happening in many fields, as ask the companies are owned by pretty much the same people.
- Why do you think there isn't more competition? I was wondering if it was too much red tape/legal risk to start up a business. Everyone is saying how greedy these companies are, so they must be charging way more than a fair price, which means an average Joe should be able to step in and provide the same stuff for a fair price.
  
  For a lot of cases the answer is lobbying, e.g. in medical/healthcare there's practical 0 competition for a lot of products because of anti-competitive laws like really shitty intellectual property laws that let prices be controlled by few (collaborating) companies. Plus there's a lot of things that are technically illegal, but in practice laws only apply to the poors so they're not really illegal for corporations: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-competitive_practices#Types
  
  quite a few of them are “natural monopolies”. for those unaware (source):
  A natural monopoly is a type of monopoly in an industry or sector with high barriers to entry and start-up costs that prevent any rivals from competing. As such, a natural monopoly has only one efficient player. This company may be the only provider of a product or service in an industry or geographic location.
  ie, cable companies, electricity suppliers, amazon. it’s really complicated and really expensive to build the infrastructure needed to meaningfully compete in those industries.
  another relevant concept is the “network effect”, defined as (source):
  a business principle that illustrates the idea that when more people use a product or service, its value increases.
  this kind of thing is more applicable to things like social media companies (they’re more appealing the more users they have). this makes it hard to compete with social media companies because convincing people to use your new app is really hard if the usefulness of it depends on everyone’s friends already being on it. (this is also part of the reason twitter is taking so painfully long to die)
  both concepts illustrate the different barriers to entry that exist when trying to compete with these giant companies. these barriers are also what allow these huge companies to get so complacent.
  (i’m not happy about quoting investopedia or wharton, but they do give simple definitions of both concepts so i did it just this once.)
  
  The Average Joe rarely has enough capital to start a promising enterprise and when they do manage to, they get bought up by the very same corporations they were trying to compete against.
  We've reached a point where corpos can just buy out the competition and do whatever they please to it.
  And it's not even a greed issue, really. The system is kill or be killed, a corporation that doesn't do this sort of shady thing won't make as much money and will be bought out by others that do.
  We have to change the rules of the game.
  
  Competition goes way down when all the different companies are owned by a very small set of huge companies. And for these companies it's easy to setup cartels and just simply not compete and jack up the prices. Competition happens when the companies must make a profit or die, not when conglomerates can trust that they're the only game in town.
because somehow our economic system says that a company is only successful if it's growing, not if it's regularly turning a profit every quarter. at least, that's my understanding of it. so, they have to do something to generate something that looks like growth somehow
It's pretty simple. Because we are all so spoiled and entitled that we won't even consider NOT buying their shit anymore. It's the same reason the video game market has grown rampant with micro transactions. They keep pushing the boundaries, and we keep giving them our money regardless of what they do. I'm actually curious to see how far they can push this insanity. They already slap a new year on sports titles every year and somehow sell the same game to the same people annually.
PUT YOUR WALLET DOWN.
- The amount of people on Reddit who shill for companies like EA and Activision is shocking.
  Once wrote a comment on the lines of 'sadly, British gamers mostly have terrible taste in video games, 90% of us don't give a shit about anything unless it's GTA, FIFA or Call of Duty. We literally reward companies for shitty consumer practices.'
  Most of the replies I got were calling me an asshole and were acting like I'm trying to police what people can like/dislike.
  But still, Electronic Arts make record-breaking profits because... EA Sports: It's In The Game (you bought last year)
  
  Any platform you find corporate asshole lickers. They are the worst.
- We also all (in the US especially) collectively choose Chinese made products over domestic options as if the only consequence is that we pay less money and are thus a savvy customer ... helping destroy a huge portion of the middle class that worked in manufacturing.
  Maybe the robots would've gotten things where they are now eventually, but nowhere near as fast.
- Best one of the newest releases is Street Fighter 6. Not just a full price game with a yearly season pass, which is fair for a service game and additional content, but also more frequent battle passes and the cherry on top, not only you pay for additional costumes as before, but each character has only 2 colors available. How much for a simply different RGB value you might wonder, a whopping over $100 for all colors. Didn't buy this well executed game, because I refuse to partake in this.
  This set the precedent for Mortal Kombat 1 DLC which is also filled with high cost and still charges outrageous money for new Fatalities.
- At this point thought can we really victim blame? Like were all just advanced moneys and it turns out almost every monkey in this environment will get addicted and capitilists are happy to use that maliciously.
  It issue is systematic at the least, and I can almost gaurentee won't be solved in the next century by a couple people voting with just their wallets
  
  It's both. We are both simultaneously capable of free will, yet are also products of the universe that created us. So my answer to your question, in my humble opinion, is yes. Yes, we can victim blame while simultaneously lamenting the corporate landscape.
  Let's make this simpler. This corporate greed is a problem, yes? What actions have you taken to remove this problem?
- Agreed. This is why I download mp3s and buy CDs still. Radio and Spotify streaming is good, but honestly, a better idea or service would be free group book reading events and coffee, help those budding writers etc to share ideas and increase the entropy and size of our universe lol
in dodge v ford the supreme court ruled that publicly traded companies must put profits first above their workers and the the build quality of their products.
- That's a bad take. The case actually affirmed business judgement rule: the idea that the guy running the company knows how to run it better than the shareholders. It's part of why post-war America is considered the golden age of American manufacturing: Publicly traded companies invested in their employees and wages exploded across the board. A 100 year old court decision isn't the primary driver on a problem that's really only developed in the last forty or fifty years.
  
  Jack Welch of GE really set the current tone of "all that matters is stock price". The 80s saw greed transform into a virtue
  
  I think it's come about due to the state of universities and the stringent belief that a pursuit of knowledge above all else would somehow land you a good job. You've got to want to do the job or genuinely enjoy the work first.
  Just consider that the same people in the Middle East who are matchmakers and run big data collection corps also run the whole breakups shake up.
- Interesting....
I assume because some fucking ghoul noticed people liked taking them for their cars so now we just don't get napkins!
They were probably just out and too busy to restock or something. It happens. Never been to a fast food place where they don't provide napkins and I steal napkins from the taco bell I live near regularly. What a weird overreaction.
- Ya, this whole thread is unhinged. Very strange.
  
  A lot of people are responding to the title, not to the body of the post.
  Why was there no napkin dispenser? Dunno could be a lot of things.
  Why does everything get progressively shittier under capitalism? It's probably not related to the napkin dispenser specifically, but everything under capitalism gets progressively shittier.
  
  Welcome to lemmy. I hate big corporations but some of the people on this site will blame amazon when they stub their toe.
My satellite TV (Sky TV ... UK) subscription ended recently and they would not give me any sort of deal to sign a new contract, Come black Friday they a spamming me by email and every type of advert for great deals for NEW Customers only!
I called SKY to cancel and they offered me a better deal but we're going to charge me an admin fee to sign a new contract, they wanted me to pay them to sign a contract with them!
I told them that it was not acceptable and cancel my service, having been put through to "my manager" they eventually waived the admin fee...
How has it come to this, I'm an easy customer, I am happy with the product, I'll sign a contract if it's a good deal, but they went out of their way to lose me
- Because for every person like you that jumps through hops to get a new deal there are lots of people who just passivelly let the renewal happen under inferior conditions that they could have got if they tried.
  That's also why they put stupid hindrances in your way: such things cause many people to give up and just go along with a suboptimal renewal, ergo they make more money from acting thus than they lose from clients who say "enough is enough" and drop them (notice how you did not drop them - they lost nothing from giving you the run around and could've gained if you had given up and renewed with the shit conditions: it's pretty much a can't-loose situation for them)
  I lived in then UK for over a decade and one thing that stood out when I moved from the The Netherlands to the UK (already more than 15 years ago) and from the UK to Portugal is how much more the larger consumer-facing companies in the UK did the most that they could to take advantage of people's mistakes or laziness than in those other countries - I remember a particularly sleazy gym membership contract from Virgin were per-contract (I always read those things) the only way to cancel it before the yearly auto-renewal was to contact them during a specific week before renewal (2 weeks before end of contract if I remember it correctly), not before nor after.
  Over the whole time I was there, a handful of the most outrageous abuses when it came to consumer contracts were plugged (the one I remember the best was the creation of a rental deposit insurance to stop tenants from losing their deposits at the end of the rental agreement, as before that landlords would often just keep it all for no reason and then the only option the tenant had was take it to Court) but the whole posture of taking advantage of costumer laziness and normal mistakes (auch as, forgetting a date for canceling and auto-renewal) was widespread in the UK compared to other countries I lived in.
  As it so happens, people themselves were also to blame: I remember how amazed the rental agency guy was that I actually read the Rental Agreement and even demanded corrections before I signed anything - "Nobody reads these", he said - when even at the massive daily rate I was paid back then for my work it was still worth it to spend the 1 or 2 hours reading a contract were I was assuming a commiment of at least £15k (at the time a "reasonable" London rent for a year).
  Me in your position would've just said "fuck this", cancelled SKY and gone without (and I have done it for some things were I felt the other side had abused my trust, such as closing my account with my first bank in the UK the one and only time I was charged an overdraft fee), mainly because my early adult years happenned mostly in The Netherlands so I have their style of demanding consumer rather than the more passive and willing to overlook these things style common it the UK.
- Absolutely terrible news bro I feel for you.
So don't shop there! They'll do the bare minimum that still brings people in; the only remedy is to show them they'll lose customers.
- Wile this is something that can be generally applied to fast food restaurants, this is a problem with basically all industries, many of which exist in a space where their customers are stuck with them. EG a lot of people are stuck with walmart because they are often literally the only place around or the only place around people on the lower half of income can afford.
  
  Same with those dollar stores. They come into poor areas and drive out the small local grocers, then you get a worse product and it's your only choice.
  
  I'm in Canada. I'd love to be able to say I can totally ditch Maxi or Super C and stop supporting Loblaws and the Weston family, or Metro or Sobeys, but that would mean choosing either buying shittier produce from one of the large discount alternatives (Walmart, Super C, or similar) meaning I'd be encouraging another of those large super vertically integrated grocery chains that are driving up cost regardless, or accepting to pay 1.5x the price for all of my groceries.
  Fresh produce I can get for not too expensive from farmer's markets while in season, but for the rest, I have to choose between expensive local grocery, expensive grocery chain, or budget grocery chains that are owned by one of the expensive chains anyway.
  
  It's past Thanksgiving and I don't even celebrate it, but I'm so fucking thankful to live in a European suburb. There is a small general store just down the street, two bakeries, a butcher, a car mechanic, a tire service shop, a bike service shop, two schools, two playgrounds, and too many smaller businesses to count. All within ten minutes on foot. Also three stops for six bus lines, safe sidewalks, and safe bicycle paths, so basically /c/fuckcars's wet dream.
  
  My local grocery chain is a lot better quality than Walmart in some respects. But, the price tag is usually much steeper. Thank God for Aldi's.
  I like to support the little guy when possible but when it makes your monthly grocery bill $1,200 instead of $900, that's a tough pill to swallow. That $300 wouldn't necessarily break the bank for me but it's a lot of money to a lot of people.
  This is also a big reason that many Americans have poor nutrition. Processed junk food is cheaper than healthy food. Presenting better lifestyle or diet "choices" is an illusion when you have to have money to make those choices.
  
  Even they are pricy, once the competition is quashed.
- More importantly, don't work there. Giving your labor to these businesses is just as bad, if not worse as spending your money there.
  
  These are both really easy sentiments to have. In the real world, we eat the food we can afford and work wherever will hire us.
  
  The problem then becomes a lack of shelter, in addition to quality clothing and quality food.
- those greedy bastard taco bell employees
Because you won't do anything to hurt their bottom line, basically.
Stop eating at Taco Bell and make your own damn tacos at home. Better yet, go buy some from a family-owned taco truck instead.
- Yeah, I don't eat at Taco Bell when I'm in the mood for tacos from a street truck. It's like two entirely different types of food.
  There is Mexican food, there's Tex Mex, then there is Taco Bell. They're not really all comparable 1:1:1. I love me an al pastor taco from a truck, but some days I'm not in the mood for a real taco but rather the ersatz tacos they have at Taco Bell.
  
  See my stoned Canadian ass doesnt have any taco trucks nearby, but the bell is always there
  (but I gotta agree its far from authentic, its like a good smoked burger vs bigmac)
  
  Extra points for ersatz
- I have taco tortillas. What do I put inside? Any good recipes?
  
  https://youtu.be/SLaltfyTEno?si=cZO2NIjd0eqCKJez
- Taco trucks are so good right now. They're not wasting money on unused dining room space so lots of meat!
- This individualist approach simply does not work in practice as has been demonstrated time and again. The problem is a systemic one created by the mechanics and incentives of the capitalist economy. The solution is to work towards an economic system that doesn't create perverse incentives inherent in capitalism.
Do you really have to ask? Capitalism, when it goes unchecked, turns everything shitty. Capitalism has been relatively unchecked in the US for the last 50 years, so everything is shitty. That’s starting to change as unions become more powerful again, but they’re still a fraction of what they were in the early 20th century. Late stage capitalism, baby!
- mArXiSm
  go actually read Marx, dude was smart af.
  
  Anything in particular? He has boocoos of books.
- Not only are unions enjoying a resurgence holding employers to account, the FTC under Lina Khan is doing antitrust for the first time in most of our lifetimes. It's bad now, but it will get better if we fight for it like we did back then.
- Unions have nothing to do with companies enshittifying their products and services
- Free the beers and we might see some novel inventions like the Japanese toilet bidet )
Because your rights have been eroded by decades of deregulation and lobbying. And because publicly traded companies are legally required to maximize profits at all costs.
Taco bell has switched their demographic from dining in, to take out and drive thru. Started with the pandemic, that's why most stuff that used to be readily available isn't put out anymore. All the taco bells in my area did this, same with several other fast food chains.
Why I don't eat out as much is because of the shrinkflation. Back in the mid 90's you used to be able to get a whopper for a dollar. Now they're pushing $6 and they just aren't the same anymore. More if you get a meal.
We're in a modern gilded age. There are no consequences for modern day robber barons.
- To add to this -- Cory Doctorow, the very guy who coined the term "enshittification," has written about this. (Been meaning to read some of his books to see his explanations on how to fight it but I'm still getting through another book right now so I've only seen vids and read a sample.)
Because the corporations write the rules. Literally; laws are written by corps and presented to lawmakers along with "gifts" and "campaign donations" - and implicit quid pro quo. They then present them to be voted upon, sometimes without even bothering to read them.
- Exactly that. We are run by corporations more so than our elected officials. A lot of people fail to fully understand this fact. Corporations and capitalism is the answer to why everything sucks.
- And no matter how well documented it is, people just go "nuh uh" and call you a socialist if you bring it up.
- See enshittification.
I'm with you, OP: for some reason, it's the little things I notice.
I'm in grocery stores a lot. It used to be, there was a nice little seating area there to sit, drink my coffee and work. But now, because homeless people dared to duck inside a public-facing area to briefly escape the elements, they removed many of the tables and chairs and they're now a big, empty space. Heaven forbid they add more seating, actually staff enough people to enforce a time-limit, etc; no, instead we all are worse off for it. But corporate profits have never been higher, so worth it, right!?
- Take a trip to PA, all the grocery and convenience stores have added seating areas so that they can legally sell beer and wine lmao.
  
  They piloted this in Nashville at Kroger and something changed for them to turn around and remove them.
Did you ask if they had some napkins? Yes we are living in a post capitalist nightmare but honestly, seems more likely the wage slave in charge of putting out the napkins either hadn’t had a chance to do so or forgot.
- If there's an empty napkin dispenser, that would be my assumption. But it's been happening more often and at more places that no, they don't even have dispensers, you need to ask for napkins.
Theres a few problems
Companies trying to maximize profits
Corrupt political systems lets companies exploit their workers and customers alike
Supply chains have been getting disrupted more and more. "Just in time" and getting "just enough" supplies no longer works well. A lot of stuff gets delayed or out of stock
We expect unlimited resources on a finite planet. Whether its plastic junk, useless tech, or food we expect it to be available 24/7/365
- A big one that you missed is
  It's socially acceptable and even encouraged for companies to fuck their customers. People assume that not being fucked over by a company means that company isn't doing well.
Oh it's even more complex.
Who sells those napkins?
(Answer; Sysco. If a place is short on napkins, Sysco is turning the screws on the franchise owner).
People haven't learned to vote with their wallets
- As was once said(something like): if vote with your wallet, the people with bigger wallets get more votes.
  
  Capitalism: a short story.
  
  Yep that's true, but I think in the long haul appealing to more people is better than just one
  
  Sounds like a weird saying.
  It assumes that the people with bigger wallets also use a larger portion (absolute money, not percentages) on the "thing" to begin with. If the billionaire and the middle class man uses 10€ on the same thing a month, and both stop doing it, then they both got the same amount of "votes". Much more fitting would be: "if you vote with your wallet, people who spend more money get more votes".
  Of course this only applies if you're talking about boycots etc, and not about buying stuff.
  And yes, people with bigger wallets probably have more sway and power when it comes to get getting their way if they want to, but when people talk about voting with your wallet, they're not talking about this.
- No, this line of thinking is wrong, I wish people would stop saying this. Voting with your wallet never works when 1% has >50% of wealth. It’s easier for 5% of people (wealthy, top execs) to agree on milking the rest than 95% of people to agree on boycotting a certain brand. That’s why we have regulations, we wouldn’t need them if “voting with wallets” actually worked.
  Free market capitalism got us to this point, it cannot take us out of this.
  
  1% might have 50% of the wealth, they do not account for 50% of the spending. Especially not at Taco Bell.
  Pure capitalism is broken af, but companies like this will feel it if 10% of costumers stops going there. The increase in price can recover some of it, but only to a certain extent. It's a simple supply and demand issue.
  That being said, I'm not from the US, so take my opinion on local issues with a grain of salth. And I definitely don't mean to imply that wealth inequality is not an issue. On the contrary.
- Hard to do that when everything is a fucking oligopoly. If you don’t like Taco Bell, have fun also avoiding KFC, Pizza Hut, and The Habit, all owned by Yum! Brands.
  
  Go to your locally owned Mexican restaurant instead.
  Stop letting advertising direct your purchasing intent towards mega-corp brands.
- We're in a generation of complacency. Nobody cares and our to busy consuming to care.
  
  A sizeable chunk is too busy surviving.
We're going to through the "enshittification" as a society. There was the Great Recession, the DotCom Bust, the Great Inflation, etc.
What is going to matter, is can we use this "enshittification" to benefit society by increasing wages, encouraging social mobility, protecting and enshrining rights for marginalized communities, etc. Building a more inclusive society.
- We're at the end stage of capitalism.
  
  A late stage, but not the end. It can get much worse.
  
  Nah you're just dramatising because you've downsized
- this is the ultimate result of shareholder theory. after a company hits their efficiency stride based on its resources and theres no more innovation to fuel profit, what else can it do but make shit smaller/less effective/worse. we just need an economic theory that includes broader society in the scope of fiduciary duties that businesses will actually take seriously.
  
  Google can always try to to space lol
- Your hopeful I like you
Simple things are going backwards but in a few hundred years Starbucks is gonna start giving handjobs. So thats kinda nice
- I don't think we have time for lattes.
  
  I'll start worrying when we get a TV show about a guy that likes getting his balls kicked, I could totally go for a latte!
Yep.
Corporations have a fiduciary responsibility to their shareholders. They have to make money. And how much money do they have to earn? MORE.
To grow, they offer good food at a reasonable price. It seems cheaper to put the drink machine out for customers to make their own drinks choices… but then we need those extra pennies, so behind the counter it goes, so customers don’t get free refills… then how can we source cheaper stuff, beef beans etc. there will be c constant demand to squeeze every penny from the system… Bob is making too much; better fsck his schedule until he quits so we can hire Alice as she make only minimum wage.
I’m not sure where napkins fall in the chain but yes the quality likely will continue to spiral down.
There are very few companies who recognize that there is a quality floor they should not go below. Where they acknowledge that we can’t get any worse, but they have to raise prices. And depending on the managers this cycle will continue back and forth
- Can we stop with the myth that "corporations/board members have a fiduciary duty to share holders for maximum profit"
  It's not true and never has been! It's just some bullshit that was said in the 80s that sounds good but has no basis in reality
  
  I mean, they do though? I'm totally against that, but hear me out: if we infiltrated for instance, and tried to do the opposite approach of only screwing the shareholders while providing maximum value to workers and consumers, we wouldn't last long enough to bring it to a vote at the corrupted board. If you don't provide a solid plan on how you're gonna fuck consumers in the coming quarter, they won't even let you stay on as CEO. It's literally not possible to do good in this system, you can either not participate and keep getting fucked as consumers/workers, or you can trade class and provide value for shareholders, there is no in between anymore. The only option that will change this without another Teddy, is revolution. Hopefully a peaceful one.
  
  No?
  As long as upper level management receives bonuses based on share price, and the board reenforces that…
  The stock market is a voting machine not a weighing machine.
  I simply disagree Management generally must keep increasing ARPU average revenue per user or else the market punishes the stock price
- Dumb question: did the laws change or was it a change in trends to maximize shareholder returns?
  
  There was a cultural shift in the 1970s:
  From the end of World War II until the late 1970s, a retain-and-reinvest approach to resource allocation prevailed at major U.S. corporations. They retained earnings and reinvested them in increasing their capabilities, first and foremost in the employees who helped make firms more competitive.
  See https://corpgov.law.harvard.edu/2019/08/22/so-long-to-shareholder-primacy/#:~:text=The%20shift%20to%20shareholder%20primacy,increase%20its%20profits.%E2%80%9D%20Subsequently%2C
  
  A shift in corporate mindset to maximize growth and profit. Go research Jack Welsh.
  https://podcasts.apple.com/gb/podcast/part-one-jack-welch-is-why-you-got-laid-off/id1373812661?i=1000612309266
  
  Not at all is that a dumb question.
  See the other comments.
  It is much more cultural than anything else.
  As the stock market moved from buy and hold for the long term to the more manic trading we see today where shit like robinhood allows everyone to trade options
Well you know all those boomers retiring ? They not doing work anymore but that's not the worst of it. Now they are spending that retirement money instead of stashing it.
So they're selling their stocks and now the companies need cash or demonstrate profit growth or else their share prices will tank.
- Got a source for the claim that a boomer stock sell off is driving factor? I would have just made greed the motivator.
  Spending money is good for the economy. Retiring is good for the economy, that means someone else gets that higher pay job slot. Retirees should be living off of dividends, 401ks and IRAs, not volatile stock sell offs.
  
  Retirees should be living off of dividends, 401ks and IRAs, not volatile stock sell offs.
  If you're only going to live another 10 or 20 years but you have $1M stashed... do you take the $1M now and buy a fancy house? Or do you keep that $1M going for the... checks math ... few tens of thousands of dollars it'll earn in yearly dividends? Meanwhile your daughter needs a new hair-do, your son is living in your basement again, and your wife... well she's your wife. And she wants that new car that you promised you'd get her when you retire.
  I guess it's back to the grind instead.
- Meh, if they're selling it, the company will have certain people simply set up a trust fund with beneficiaries being key employees or research and development team players, then strategically buy back shares at low prices and use the company shares as leverage for their next big idea at whatever company meet up happens. Think Defcon but limited to internal players. Even at a loss, the company will generally become self sustaining so long as the players on the team have a minimum degree of commitment
It's because of the napkin gnomes. Nobody can ever catch them.
- Collect napkin
  ???
  Profit
Republicans. They have blockaded any possible reform.
- *liberals
Also everything breaks in five years at best. Doesn't matter how much you spend, basically everything is shit quality minimum viable products.
- This is why I never buy anything with lithium batteries, and my career is a computer repair technician. When the batteries die, they are often irreplaceable even by an expert. The entire inside of so many "smart" and wireless devices are drowned in industrial adhesive and can only be destructively disassembled. Watch ifixit's videos on air pods teardowns, they are impossible to repair.
  
  Same. I won't buy anything that isn't repairable unless it's like a one time need
  
  Thankfully on most laptops the battery is easy to replace. The keyboards though...
- Planned obsolescence keeps us consuming.
  
  I also think there's a general lack of QA. Whether it's a bug or a feature, they're trying to push things out so fast now that shit breaks even if they don't intentionally plan obsolescence.
  Planned obsolescence is definitely a modern travesty though. It really ought to be illegal
The US has not set up a system that compensates properly. Most European countries have a security net in place when capitalism squeezes regular people. The US does not. You're on your own.
Maybe they just didn’t restock the napkins? Dude went to Taco Bell and almost had an aneurysm
- look at all these comments, they think Taco Bell CEO himself sent down a decree that there will be no napkins.
  
  I worked at a couple of national franchises fast food places (I refuse to call them restaurants) that specifically said two napkins per visit. We have out more on request, but regional cut the manager’s bonus for it.
  
  do you think they're above doing that
- Cut him some slack. He's dining in at a taco bell. Not exactly a high point in his life, nor a mark of stability
It's a shame so much time has passed for the public to even recall how much Teddy fought for the average Joe blow public with his first deal. He fought the corporate overloads and they couldn't believe he couldn't be bribed like those before him and since.
The things that will destroy America are prosperity-at-any-price, peace-at-any-price, safety-first instead of duty-first, the love of soft living, and the get-rich-quick theory of life. -Theodore Roosevelt
- And he was even a right winger, iirc.
"WE" don't. You all might. Playing my role as a "consumer" I expect a certain level of customer service. If it doesn't meet my standard, I stop consuming.
If it isn't meeting your standard, stop.
- BRB gonna stop buying groceries now.
We really can vote with our dollars. The issue is that we don’t (I’m point right at myself here).
Don’t buy the things, we probably don’t need em.
- Induvidual action will never be enough, 'voting with your wallet' is a fantasy.
Unionize, as an induvidual you are ultimatily powerless, as a collective not so much.
Modern society does everything it can to prevent you from collectivising, long work hours, low pay, private healthcare, high rent; all meant to make you work so hard you never have a chance to group up and demand better; resist it and organize.
Ask for napkins, if they won't give you any, pour a soda out on the counter and steal some of the paper towels they use to clean it up. (Actually don't, this method isn't nice for the workers)
It's going to be a fun next few years. Corpo dickheads keep trying to make another nickel next quarter, but more and more people have had enough. If food is too expensive, people will start stealing it, and the police can't be everywhere. Better hope there isnt 't some global pandemic or something that would suddenly make it acceptable to wear a mask in public.
- Thay only works when the food at the grocery store is cheap. And it really isn't. I've been cooking at home, and even growing some of my own food, and someone who works two jobs or a lot of overtime isnt going to be able to do it, no matter the cost.
The trick is they do this because "you" keep showing up. Spend literally 30-45 minutes to make a pile of taco fixings that will taste better, be healthier, and be cost competitive (if cooked in bulk).
- Exactly, why would they even put napkins out if the customers still come.
- Went to McDs for the "convenience" of an egg sandwich the other day. Was told to pull into spot #1 to wait. TWENTY MINUTES LATER they brought the food and couldn't muster anything resembling an apology. So I guess I'll be making my own fucking egg sandwiches from now on.
  
  Sounds like you should be making your own breakfast sandos from now on!
  Each day I want breakfast, I make myself a bacon and egg on toast sandwich. That takes me 11 minutes to make, and costs me under a dollar using local suppliers.
  Not only does it not taste like hyperprocessed greaseball garbage like McDicks is, I also don't have to drive to get it!
  
  Welcome to the rest of your life. You're gonna have the best brekkie sandos
It's the natural end for a free market. The big players take over and squeeze every drop of blood they can from the consumer class until the inevitable collapse or B&L buys the government.
- No, there's another ending. J&J buys the government.
- People need to be willing to suffer small conveniences to send a message to companies, but they aren't. And then they complain that the government should step in, while they constantly elect people who protect business interests and are anti-consumer in the name of "small government."
  It's requires at least one or the other... a free market with consumers who drive the demand, or big government. With neither, you end up with constant corporate abuses.
  
  How do you prevent misinformation in a free market that misleads your customers? Every problem can be greenwashed away by corporations. Even independent investigative organisations won't have the resources to really drill down and figure stuff out. Without tax funded government entities I can't see how they are made responsible.
  Every free market will concentrate capital, with that power and with that information and the customers' ability to make good choices.
Its shitty only for the poor. Rich has the best life there. If you're rich , move to US Of A
- To be fair, lots of poor people move to the USA, I think it's just a high competition space is the issue
  
  Yea better than living in 3rd world countries.
Everything is cheaper and made of thinner materials. But I can't tell if it tastes worse because it's of lesser quality or because of the covid I had.
- Ngl think it's this too, read somewhere that dyes used in commercial products were strained so some products started literally looking thinned out. Personally I saw it in our lab gloves, the blue dye was looking....not uniform. Everywhere there is probably some strain on production and people being stressed tf out.
What do you expect from a place like Taco Bell? You are enabling their behavior by giving them money.
- Napkins seem like a pretty normal thing to expect at any eating establishment.
  
  Particularly one with the grease content of Taco Bell.
- They're starting the transition to the three sea shells
bruh they just didn't have napkins, the employees probably just didn't give a shit
I mean things are getting shittier but you're complaining about napkins?
- I think the point is more that we live in a time where "because we cut napkins to add pennies to our bottom line" is an answer we have to seriously consider. Even if it isn't the case, it's plausible enough to be awful.
Yep! If everyone keeps buying shitty pastries that come from plastic bags at Starbucks then they're going to keep making them. Enjoy.
because people swallow. stop going to that taco bell or taco bell in general. likewise for other things.
The napkins thing is a thing at McD near me.
You have to stand there and wait for about five minutes to flag down a member of staff (they’re all in the back now due to the self serve kiosks). The same for sauces. Which to me says that my time is meaningless to them. They don’t trust us to not take too many but they’re also too lazy to put some in every customers bag.
I will no longer eat there due to this and the crazy prices for the same mediocre food.
Fucking ghouls. Yet we have debates at work all the time and I’m seen as some weirdo for not wanting to be fleeced by every company on the planet.
Be like me and steal what you can from these companies. Commit delivery fraud (item never arrived when it did). Raise chargebacks etc. take what you can as that’s what they’re doing. Just don’t do it to sole businesses.
- Be like me and steal what you can from these companies. Commit delivery fraud (item never arrived when it did). Raise chargebacks etc. take what you can as that’s what they’re doing. Just don’t do it to sole businesses.
  Nah, don't do this.
  Imagine being an Uber Eats or Deliveroo driver trying to make an honest living and getting sacked because some absolute bloomy rind dick cheese told people on the internet to submit fraudulent non-delivery claims.
  Now imagine they alert other businesses that you steal from customers and now you're unemployable because of what I stated above.
  You're suggesting something that will seriously fuck over the average wagie but still keep the board of directors in their comfy black leather seats. Just don't give them your business.
  I'm willing to bet you never actually worked in a customer facing job, otherwise you'd have more empathy for the average worker...
  
  I’m not stealing food from Uber eats bro. I’m talking orders from Amazon and claiming they sent an inferior item.
  Edit: also I ain’t ever ordering Uber Eats. Paying double for someone to bring me soggy food.
  
  For sure. Steal from the till of a megacorp who gives a shit, get a gig worker fired for a free burrito? Thats a huge dick move
  
  Also, every job I’ve had until my current one has been customer service. Either facing or over the phone. Should have taken that bet.
because it is not designed to be good but just to make money
You are all foolish and thought global suicide was NOT their primary objectives. Corporations, Wealth, Religion, etc. etc. are all thing you would call bullshit but the God of the Dead is sick of your shit.
Maybe they are out of them because some ghoul took all of them to clean their car? One self entitled customer.
I think it's less that we're expected to sympathize, and more just that they've realized enough people will tolerate it. With OP's example, Taco Bell has clearly decided that whatever business they may lose due to people deciding to not go to Taco Bell anymore because of the lack of napkins will be less than whatever they save by not stocking napkins anymore.
And they're right.
Don't get me wrong, it's a shitty thing to do, but between people in general not realizing that this place doesn't even have napkins anymore, and people deciding they still want semi-delicious garbage tacos anyway, they're really not going to see a big dip in revenue. They've simply realized that they really can just make their presented experience a little shittier just to save some money.
- Well first off have Taco Bell stopped providing napkins? One person couldn't find napkins in one store and suddenly it's greed driven corporate policy according to OP?
  It seems unlikely that a food chain would completely abolish napkins. It is possible they're no longer freely available because people were taking them "for their car" whatever that even means!?
  
  Perhaps I should have clarified that for the sake of discussion I was taking OP's comment at face value, but the essentials are the same either way. Whether it's a chain-wide declaration that napkins are done, a single store doing away with them, or just a sufficiently casual attitude to restocking them that allowed them to run out in the first place, the math in the end is all the same. They can and will let their service get a little shittier, because they know they'll save more money than they lose.
- It'll be a capitastrophe.
Its hard to believe a fucking nobody bank like SVB collapsing could do this.
Are you sure they didn't just conscript the napkins for TP? It is Taco Bell after all...
- 3 sea shells about to be placed in the taco bell washrooms as cost saving measures.
If you've never operated or owned a restaurant before, it's because the top 3 expenses in a restaurant are: food, labor, and paper. Controlling paper usage helps control costs significantly. That's why.
It’s all disgusting out there.
My wife and I kicked all fast food 2010.
We use a crock pot for beans. Buy tortillas etc. We can beat Taco Bell burritos with zero worry about disease.
We transmuted our disgust for corporate hegemony into carefully crafted campaign designed to rise above it as much as possible.
And we’re not saints. Still using abuser Amazon because fuck. But we try and I ride right in by fast food faces feeling so good not to give them an effing dime.
Stop your consumerism, vote with your wallet
Taco Bell will just put out a "napkin tipping" jar and blame lack of tips for not providing napkins.
It's a pretty complicated economics question why inflation is happening. They're working on it by adjusting interest rates, I guess.
As for why the average American isn't doing so well, it's basically the rich getting richer while the poor get poorer. If this same inflation was happening with a 70's distribution of wealth (and IIRC it actually did) it wouldn't be fun but it wouldn't be pushing so many people to the brink, either.
I was just thinking how captured the basic necessity of hydration has become. So many people have become fooled into emptying their pockets to buy soda etc. and the idea of merely drinking normal water is not enough. Plus the lack of enforcement to regulate a universally clean water supply to all areas. I mean… clean accessible water is a super basic foundation of civilisation. Now corporations have diverted that need into profit and almost certainly helped derail any plans to ensure that water is safe and drinkable.
Shareholders. Part of me thinks they see the writing on the walls of climate change and want to just get the most they can out of the rest of the short time we have left.
It’s because the rate of profit has a tendency to fall.
You now live in the monopolist stage of capitalism, aka imperialism.
Read "imperialism, the highest stage of capitalism by Lenin" for more insights.
- It won't happen until there is another fourth meal option
$$$$$
I've given up being nice to CSR that work for shit companies and go to bat for them.
They need to quit or go on strike.
Buttfucking me the customer as a response to working at a shit establishment and toxic work environment does not fly any longer.
- I’ve found being nice to people, especially the folks who tend to get treated horribly, usually leads to a way better experience. They’ll go out of their way to help you if you’re nice.
  Especially in a scenario where they’re being recorded on the phone - they’d lose their jobs if they say or admit anything negative about their bosses. Some even get in trouble if they go off script.
  Just let them know your issue, if you are kind and persistent, odds are ittl worn out in your favor.
The American consumer is the worst-behaved, most deranged, most thievery-prone they've ever been in history. "The customer is always right" thinking is endemic. Roving bands of Karens are straight-up assaulting workers. People want everything for free and figure "gratis" means "loot an entire two-armed carry." Not to even get started on the fucking shoplifting!
When people abuse a privilege, you take the privilege away, from everyone. It's pretty simple. If you want a retail experience where you feel privileged and taken care of then you need to be going to places that have some kind of mechanism to keep the hoi polloi away. A membership fee, an unusual location, some kind of barrier to entry.
In fast food restaurants in the UK, you get your own napkins or they give you them on the tray when you collect your food. Or in some other non-fast food restaurants, they will bring napkins with your cutlery after you've ordered your food.
This is how it has always been and it's a slightly strange thing to get upset about.
You sound like a crybaby. No napkins for your taco equals muh capitalism!!
oh no, OP had to ask for napkins. Consumers are treated shitty because you are shitty.
- You sound fun
  
  Im the guy on the receiving end of bullshit like you and OP.

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