What are the largest rip offs in society today and what do you do about it??

I have to agree with Spidey.

Utilities are the biggest rip-offs going. Over half our hydro bill is for everything but the actual electricity we use.

To top it off they charge high transportation fees when we have a local power plant that can easily supply our area with more than enough power and we still get nailed for transportation.

Not to mention paying for the debt retirement of a previous generations abuse and mismanagment.

Just my two cents.


https://www.networthiq.com/people/GregR

Oh.... and let me add a couple of more things that I particularly felt after coming to Canada (from the US):

- Books are so expensive here. There is a huge difference between Amazon.com vs. Amazon.ca. Whenever I visit a friend in the States, I buy a whole bunch of books (sometimes in hundreds of dollars) and ship them to my friend's address and bring them back. Thank God there's no tariff on books.

- Postal Service: Canada Post is much more expensive and poorer quality than USPS.

Expense Ratio (Mutual Funds): Expense ratios on mutual funds in Canada are outrageous by American standard. I think somebody posted a link to the report that Canada received F in expense ratio in a study that compared mutual funds in 10 or 15 countries. That F is well-deserved IMHO.

(Of course, I have noticed the opposite as well. Certain things in Canada are unbelievably inexpensive. But that is for another thread.)

Weddings, funerals and babies are definitely areas where a person can be taken advantage of due to the high emotional values attached to all three. (I went with a friend to a funeral service place once and they very sleekly made us feel guilty for not buying a high quality coffin that was hermetically sealed "for enhanced preservation.")

Whole Foods is another place where it's easy to get ripped off (although one makes the choice to shop there). Bliss Balls, for example, are $10.99 at WF and $8.99 at the local Iranian corner store, yet WF buys in bulk. However, you have the choice of where to shop. Canada Post is the worst rip as there are no alternatives. I send the same item over and over to the US and (rarely) to Canada. Cost to send to US $6.70 or thereabouts with tax, and it gets to NY in three days. Cost to send to Calgary from Vancouver? Well over $9.00 and it often takes a week. You pay your money and pray the mail will arrive in a shorter time than possible with a carrier pigeon.

Pharmaceuticals are another biggie. The companies would have us believe that the high costs (and patenting) are to help them recoup the "losses" of funding clinical trials. However, when you look at their profits, it's easy to see that this is more a case of money management to benefit stakeholders. I pay $15 per triptan for my migraines. At an average eight migraines a month, that's a lot of money.

Off topic: I would love someone from this forum to write a guest column for my blog. You are all so knowledgeable.

Rosina
Middle Ageless (I changed the name)

Part of the rip-off with weddings, kids & funerals is the social pressure and expectations to which we should conform.

I will just give you an example with a funeral. I have been to one of a close family friend for the first time a few months ago. I had no idea what to expect. Other folks who have been invited told me that everyone is buying a flower stand with their's family's name on it. These things are sold in specialized boutiques and the prices still give me nightmares. We choose the cheapest one and it cost us 200$. I argued against it at first, but finally conceded that it would look really cheap if we just came with a bouquet of flowers especially since everyone else was buying one. And everyone did. It was a very showy, commercialized funeral with pretty much standardized expectations. What I would have preferred is to bring my own flowers and instead pay extra money for a mass for the soul of the deceased as is traditionnaly done in my country. It would be much more meaningful to me but nobody would have seen the last part, everyone would just have remembered that I was cheap. So I let it go, but the whole experience has been painful and frustrating for the wrong reasons. Do not even get me started on the ridiculous prices for body-preserving coffins, indoor shrines, etc I spoke to some of the salesmen after the funeral asking what the cost would be for something similar if I died. The estimated cost was beyond 30K in today's dollars.

Sorry for the long rant, but I still hate how I have been forced into this against my values by pure social pressure.

Dave