Effort, possibly, though it tends to be at the design stage rather than the manufacture stage.
Since the whole purpose of mass production is to reduce the effort at the manufacture stage, that makes sense to me.
the underside of the seat is finished as well as the top
Since this kind of detail (unlike too many cherubs) isn't ever harmful, I assume that the reason you don't get it now is that there isn't sufficient demand. And I'm going to guess that the reason that there isn't sufficient demand is that it's too expensive.
My theory is that this "too expensive" comes from somewhat inaccurate judgements. Mass production greatly reduces the number of distinct suppliers of furniture, and all but removes any flow of information from the user to the maker. The result of this is that if the maker sees a 1% reduction in costs by making the product slightly worse, he will often take it without knowing whether the users would on average have preferred to pay the extra 1%. Maybe he uses focus groups to estimate opinion, maybe he doesn't. The reason capitalism doesn't make him suffer for this is that you can't just get another maker to do you "the same as his used to be like, and here's the 1% extra", so there is no direct competition over this 1% marginal change.
Hence we get flat-pack furniture, McDonalds food, and "this product will not necessarily work on all CD players". But even at the better-quality end of things, the fact that people are used to producers cutting corners means that they can generally do so, and the fact that they can means that they will because its the same money either way.
I'd be curious to know how much of the "efficiency" of free market methods comes directly from lowering the expectations of your customers.
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timeasmymeasure
Re:
Date: 2004-02-23 04:32 am (UTC)Since the whole purpose of mass production is to reduce the effort at the manufacture stage, that makes sense to me.
the underside of the seat is finished as well as the top
Since this kind of detail (unlike too many cherubs) isn't ever harmful, I assume that the reason you don't get it now is that there isn't sufficient demand. And I'm going to guess that the reason that there isn't sufficient demand is that it's too expensive.
My theory is that this "too expensive" comes from somewhat inaccurate judgements. Mass production greatly reduces the number of distinct suppliers of furniture, and all but removes any flow of information from the user to the maker. The result of this is that if the maker sees a 1% reduction in costs by making the product slightly worse, he will often take it without knowing whether the users would on average have preferred to pay the extra 1%. Maybe he uses focus groups to estimate opinion, maybe he doesn't. The reason capitalism doesn't make him suffer for this is that you can't just get another maker to do you "the same as his used to be like, and here's the 1% extra", so there is no direct competition over this 1% marginal change.
Hence we get flat-pack furniture, McDonalds food, and "this product will not necessarily work on all CD players". But even at the better-quality end of things, the fact that people are used to producers cutting corners means that they can generally do so, and the fact that they can means that they will because its the same money either way.
I'd be curious to know how much of the "efficiency" of free market methods comes directly from lowering the expectations of your customers.