Money is not motivation...

I think it is unethical if the person has to accept the bad deal.
For example only a hand full of people sell water, but charge very much for it.
That’s just an example. Water isn’t monopolized.

But if something like water got owned by someone, all of it, then they sold it for too much, that would be a form of exploitation.

i agree. hence me saying this:

“I think your mind’s a little disoriented here.”

You are too generous, this mind is greatly disoriented here.

“It’s unethical to offer a bad deal?”

When I read just the above, I get the impression the person extending the deal has made the moral judgment the deal is a bad one. They have made the offer of the deal and the judgment it is a bad one. That does sound unethical to me. The offer hasn’t even reached my senses in its entirety for my judgment to come into play regarding its equability or its subjective moral nature. The word “deal” itself has a connotation of being good, as in the expression that was a real deal. If the person extending the offer has reached the moral judgment it is bad, it rather negates it as being a deal.

My confusion, was in regard to where the moral judgment took place. If an offer of employ is extended and I judge it to be lacking in mutually equitable benefit then I would not likely consider it a deal and that perhaps could be defined as a difference in opinion, in which case negotiation could take place to meet more equitably in the middle of our opinions.

In consideration I think I’m perhaps less disoriented then you have assessed. On the grounds alone that everyone does it has little to do with whether it is ethical or not. Perhaps you have pointed out where within our trade practices room for improvement resides.

No, there’s no amount of improvement that can eliminate bad deals without eliminating trade altogether. Say I’m selling an apple for 50 cents, but it’s a bad deal to you because you wouldn’t buy an apple for any more than 25 cents. So, one solution – lower the price to 25 cents. Maybe the costs of obtaining the apple was more than 25 cents, so now, suddenly, it’s a bad deal for me. We haven’t removed the bad deal, we’ve just switched who it’s bad for.

There will always be people selling things for more than other people want to pay for them. That’s not bad, that’s not immoral, that’s just life. Don’t pay for it. Just say no. It’s quite easy. Not a moral issue at all. Yes, I think you’re quite disoriented.

“No,”

That sounds relatively certain. Best of luck with that.

Who ever said it was my effort to eliminate, I simply recognized that there was room (opportunity) for improvement that could take place. Sort of like moving half way there in repeated increments will never get you there but does get you closer. In many human endeavors, the closer you are to the target the easier it is to hit it. I believe to mitigate is possible and perhaps to eliminate is not, but I’m going to leave some wiggle room with regard to the ‘impossible to eliminate’ conclusion as circumstances that make something appear impossible, some times, can be changed.

Carry on.

“I think your mind’s a little disoriented here. It’s unethical to offer a bad deal? Why?”

  1. Because of what I think is a definition of ethical? Clearly, you think I am mistaken in that belief. So please define ethical in such a way that the behavior would fall within its domain.

  2. What if the person doesn’t have the capacity to recognize it is a bad deal and you are so warm and trustworthy looking in your presentation the person trusts you mistakenly. Have to told them YOU think it is a bad deal or have you “sugar coated” it to appear as something other then the bad deal YOU have judged it to be? And what of their circumstance? Could there be something unusual about this persons circumstance that you are taking advantage of with your bad deal offer.

  3. Because “you” recognize it as a “bad” deal. What part of ethical includes someone else receiving something “bad” at your offer, knowing it is bad? It would be just as unethical of the person to accept your judgement of a bad deal with the knowledge it was a great deal. That happens fairly often too, but just because it happens all the time doesn’t make it ethical.

If you had an antique and took it in for valuation and the person you brought it to sensed you had no idea what you held and offered you pennies on the dollar of what it was worth, would that be offering a bad deal? And further let’s say that person took the antique, in good faith, to two other dealers who didn’t know what it was and they offered a similar fraction of its value, yet you do know, do you think that is ethical?

  1. I think it’s unethical because the word “bad” came up in the description of the “deal”.

And you have the nads to judge the state of my mind? That’s some dreadful style.

Wow, this thread is a couple years old. Interesting.

Anyway, I don’t think you’ve noticed that we seem to be using the term ‘bad deal’ differently – or rather, I think you have noticed, and you just haven’t bothered with trying to correct the situation.

My example of a ‘bad deal’ was somebody selling an apple for 50c, and somebody else thinking it’s a bad deal because they’re not willing to pay more than 25c for it.

Your example of a ‘bad deal’ was somebody deliberately and knowingly lying to someone about the value of something they owned so they could get it for pennies on the dollar. Basically ripping someone off because of their ignorance.

I think there’s a pretty big difference between the first example and the second one. I have no reason to think there’s anything unethical going on in the apple example – someone is selling something at a certain price, and someone else is unwilling to buy it.

The second one definitely has more questionable ethics. I wouldn’t say it’s quite as unethical as stealing, but it’s pretty darn close.

But, if you think it’s unethical to offer an apple for 50c to someone who doesn’t want to pay that much for an apple, please, tell me why.

The real absurdity lies within the concept of earning a living. Think about that one for a moment.

Some humor lays in taking colloquialisms to be literal statements. But very little truth lays there.

Earning a living is not a literal statement. If it was changed to, amassing resources so that our bodies may still function and parts of our lives will be easier, would you feel better?

Also for your edification:

A chain is only as strong as its weakest link, doesn’t only refer to chains.

A leopard cannot change its stripes, is not only about leopards.

And, A picture is worth a thousand words, does not mean that it is an exact number.

Just answering the question as you asked it.

“My example of a ‘bad deal’ was somebody selling an apple for 50c, and somebody else thinking it’s a bad deal because they’re not willing to pay more than 25c for it.”

In the example above; the person on the receiving end of the offer has made the judgement that it is bad and says nothing about the one offering it thinking it is bad.

Your question, however, was worded differently. You asked; “It is unethical to offer a bad deal? Why?”

Earlier I wrote: “When I read just the above, I get the impression the person extending the deal has made the moral judgment the deal is a bad one. They have made the offer of the deal and the judgment it is a bad one. That does sound unethical to me. The offer hasn’t even reached my senses in its entirety for my judgment to come into play regarding its equability or its subjective moral nature. The word “deal” itself has a connotation of being good, as in the expression that was a real deal. If the person extending the offer has reached the moral judgment it is bad, it rather negates it as being a deal.”

And you respond with this?
“Anyway, I don’t think you’ve noticed that we seem to be using the term ‘bad deal’ differently – or rather, I think you have noticed, and you just haven’t bothered with trying to correct the situation.”

So essentially you are no longer asking why offering a bad deal is unethical. You recognize it. Thanks.

The concept of earning a living fits well within a fictitious moral metanarrative.

It suggests how people ought to live as and be.

Please extrapolate on that.

I recognize that there are instances where offering a bad deal can play a part in unethical behavior.

The statement ‘offering a bad deal is unethical’ is too broad, too unqualified; if you told that to someone outside of the context of this conversation, they would probably think of an example like the one I thought of – selling something at a price somebody else doesn’t want to pay – and would not understand what’s so unethical about it. There is nothing inherently unethical about offering something at a price that someone else is unwilling to pay for it.

So please try to recognize what I really did agree to, rather than just saying ‘Nananana I won.’

Money is the religion and mass ritual of the state whom has become god as the center. We live in a monetary theocracy folks.

You are the one that believes it, shouldn’t you do it? Stop being lazy and earn your own way. :smiley:

Everybody that participates in it is conditioned to still others just go along with all because of coercion.

I’m sorry, I think I know what you are trying to say, but I don’t want to put words in your mouth. Please rewrite that sentence.

Who the hell dug up this dead old thread???

I think Ty makes a good point. I doubt he’s missed the fact that it’s a figure of speech, but one has to wonder why sometimes figures of speech are phrased the way they are. To call the practice of working in exchanging for money “earning a living” certainly puts a somewhat biased spin on it, making it out to seem like one has an obligation to work in order to have the right to live. But I also question what “work” is supposed to entail here. I think Ty makes a good point if it were that by “work” one means “working for the man,” but if by “work” we mean getting off your ass and putting some effort into some form of physical labor, then I’d say all animals need to “earn a living” in order to eat, stay sheltered, fend for themselves, etc. If they expect to survive by just sitting there waiting for their resources to come to them and for predators to keep away and respect their right to live and not be harmed, then they have another thing coming (which isn’t to say it would be necessarily unethical of them, but stupid). On the other hand, I think “earning a living” typically means “getting a job”–as opposed to living in the wild and hunting for food and building your own shelter, etc.–but even here I question whether the biases of this slang expression are unwarranted, for it seems to me that we just don’t live in a world anymore where living off the land as the animals do is much of an option anymore, and society with its modern economic structures is pretty much the new environment; “earning a living” in that case might just connote nothing more than the fact that getting a job is just how one lives now a days, and that it would be stupid (but not necessarily unethical) for one to sit on his ass and wait for the money to pour in all by itself. Knowing Ty, however, he does not subscribe to this interpretation.

So you want to live like an animal? I prefer medicine and consistent food. I can deal with working for someone else quite easily.

But, I encourage you to go with the animal rote. The life span of such people is much shorter, and it would successfully remove you from the gene pool. Which means a lesser chance of my child having to deal with such things.

Ty and Gib are right (largely).

Today’s socialist regime is based on “you live only to serve our society”. And “our society” runs on Money thus if you do not earn Money from us, you do not earn the right to live, and there is no longer anywhere to escape to.

It isn’t an issue of either being social or anti-social. It is the lack of choice as to which type of social one might want to be. Because it has been dictated that “society shall run via Money”, choices have been removed. One either lives via money or is “anti-social”.

And if “We” don’t like you are any reason at all, through authoritarian vote, we will deny you Money (earned or not) and remove you from our society. Void of Money, Media (communication), and/or Medicine, you will simply vanish from our holy presence - “voted off the island”. And no one will even know. It has been going on successfully for decades. It isn’t even about to change.

Who said that? I was merely doing an analysis on the phrase “earn a living”.