Priceless Quotes

“We choose between descriptions of options, rather than between the options themselves.”
― William Poundstone, Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value

“Many people like myself who teach marketing start the course by saying, ‘We’re not about manipulating consumers, we’re about discovering needs and meeting them,’ ” said Eric Johnson of Columbia University. “And then, if you’re in the field awhile, you realize, yes, we can manipulate consumers.”
― William Poundstone, Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value

“One of the things that price consultants have learned is that what consumers say and what they do are not the same thing.”
― William Poundstone, Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value

“The trouble is, these four domains of behavior coexist in all of us. A person who is risk-averse in one situation will turn reckless in another. All it takes is a changed reference point.”
― William Poundstone, Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value

“It was like pulling the strings on a marionette. Huber and Puto found they could make the students want one beer or the other, just by adding a third choice that few or no one wanted.”
― William Poundstone, Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value

“They note that the coherent arbitrariness of salaries is tacitly recognized in an old one-liner: A wealthy man is one who earns $100 more than his wife’s sister’s husband.”
― William Poundstone, Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value

“There are two ways of mentally representing money, one based on actual dollars and another based on buying power. Practically everyone knows that the first way is “wrong” whenever there’s inflation. But both representations command attention and both affect decisions, sometimes unconsciously. This suggests that the money illusion may be a form of anchoring.”
― William Poundstone, Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value

“There are those who seize advantages because they think they can get away with it, and others who find their only bargaining chip to be a self-destructive veto. In a real sense, we all play the ultimatum game.”
― William Poundstone, Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value

“Flipping the gains to losses flips the types of behavior. When losses are likely, reckless gambles become acceptable (lower left cell).”
― William Poundstone, Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value

“Authentic humans don’t show the perfect, chessmaster appreciation of consequences that von Neumann’s theory demands. Instead, decision makers resort to heuristics, or mental shortcuts, to arrive at quick, intuitive choices.”
― William Poundstone, Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value

“One of Stevens’s epigrams ran, ‘Black is white with a bright ring around it.’ The Orwellian tone of that statement is justified. Stevens knew only too well that you can get people to believe almost anything about their own perceptions with a little sleight of hand. Subjectively, there are no absolutes, only contrasts.”
― William Poundstone, Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value

“The Edwardses raised dachshunds, one named Willy (after”
― William Poundstone, Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value

“When people are given three prices (think of those for small, medium, and large coffee), and they have no strong preference, they tend to pick the “middle” price. Morgan”
― William Poundstone, Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value

“The stumbling block isn't the certainty effect per se. It's the way that smart people are influenced by mere words, by the way the choices are framed.”
― William Poundstone, Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value

“Isn't human mind a funny thing? A bullet is a bullet, dead is dead. The reduction in probability of your demise is precisely the same in both cases. Why isn't your price the same?”
― William Poundstone, Priceless: The Myth of Fair Value