Rents
How Marketing Causes Inequality
Delivery estimate
Please enter a valid 4-digit Australian postcode.
to ·
Delivery estimate
Please enter a valid 4-digit Australian postcode.
to ·
Rents
Description
A surprising new explanation for the radical growth of income inequality—and a new strategy for stopping it.
Income inequality has risen dramatically since the 1970s. But why, exactly? In Rents, Gerrit De Geest argues that the main cause is advances in marketing. Marketers have become better at causing and exploiting market distortions in legal ways. The legal system tries to prevent the deliberate creation of market failures, but it has not evolved at the same speed. Business schools have outsmarted law schools.
Over the time span 1970–2015, the impact of marketing on the economy has steadily increased, transforming competitive markets in less competitive ones by making prices less transparent, splitting informed and uninformed consumers, making products incomparable, locking in consumers, or exploiting psychological biases. This has increased the amount of artificial profits in the economy—called “rents” in economic jargon.
The result? Using a novel method, De Geest estimates that rents now amount to 35 percent of the economy. This means that out of every $100 you spend, on average $35 goes to profits that could not have been made in perfectly competitive markets. That was only $20 in 1970. The book shows how getting wealthy has become less a matter of working hard than of capturing rents.
A book that will explain both why your boss makes many times your salary and why the prices you pay for groceries keep changing.
“If you have a favorite brand of cars, airlines, aspirins, or smart-phones, then you are part of the problem of income inequality. This is the startling message of Gerrit De Geest’s remarkable book. It will change your view of consumerism, the source of wealth, and the uneasy role of business schools in the modern economy. It is a book that will also make you a more interesting dinner companion!"—Saul Levmore, William B. Graham Distinguished Service Professor, University of Chicago Law School
“This is one of those rare books that fundamentally change the way you look at the world. Marketing professors, De Geest argues, teach businesses how to exploit consumers. As a result, you pay too much for virtually every product and service you purchase. Once the book makes you see the problem, you cannot unsee it, and it is everywhere! A provocative new theory of what goes wrong in the modern economy and why some people make so much more money than others.”—Giuseppe Dari Mattiacci, Professor of Law and of Economics, University of Amsterdam
“Could the rising inequality in our society be the result of clever marketing ploys taught in business schools? Gerrit De Geest has written an original and powerful work on how so much creative and entrepreneurial effort is aimed at destroying the forces of competition, raising prices, and diverting value from people to firms. A law professor’s indictment of the law’s ineptitude in defending against greed, Rents sheds important new light on one of the biggest policy challenges of our time.”—Omri Ben-Shahar, Kearney Director of the Coase-Sandor Institute for Law and Economics, University of Chicago
“In this captivating book, Professor De Geest highlights the underappreciated link between marketing and inequality. … Novel and important, I highly recommend this book.”—Oren Bar-Gill, W.J. Friedman and A.T. Friedman Professor of Law and Economics, Harvard Law School
Gerrit De Geest is the Charles F. Nagel Professor of International and Comparative Law at Washington University School of Law. Before moving to St. Louis with his family, he was a professor at the Utrecht School of Economics and president of the European Association of Law and Economics.
Shipping & Processing
This item is in stock with our supplier and usually ships within 3–5 business days.
Processing times
- In stock: Items marked “In Stock” are on our shelves. We pick, pack and ship them within 1–2 business days.
- In stock with our supplier: Items not marked “In Stock” are held by one of our Australian or overseas suppliers. We order them in for you and they usually dispatch within 2–5 business days (3–5 for some suppliers). The estimate next to the price is for this item.
- Special orders: Some supplier items, such as specialist and imported items, titles awaiting reprint and print-on-demand titles, take longer to arrive. If your order includes one, we’ll update you as soon as we hear from our supplier.
- Supplier delays: Occasionally a supplier is delayed, or their stock information turns out to be inaccurate. We’ll keep your order open for up to 60 days. If an item hasn’t shipped or isn’t on its way to us by then, we’ll cancel that item and refund it.
How accurate is availability?
Availability is based on the stock levels our suppliers tell us they hold, and we update it regularly. If a supplier issue affects your order, we’ll let you know with an updated estimate.
Delivery
- As soon as your order ships you’ll get an email with tracking.
- Australia Post usually delivers within 2–10 business days of shipping (around 4 in metro areas and around 6 in regional areas).
- If your order has more than one item, we hold the in-stock items until everything is ready, so we can ship your whole order together in one parcel.
- Shipping cost: Free on orders over $100 within Australia, otherwise $9.95 flat rate per order however many items you buy. Free shipping applies to Australian addresses only; delivery to New Zealand is $14.95 per order.
- Check your address: If an order goes to an incorrect address you gave us, or isn’t collected and Australia Post returns it to us, you’ll need to pay the postage to send it again.
Cancellations
Need to change or cancel an order? Contact us as soon as possible at contact@bookloop.com.au or through our contact page.
- Within 30 minutes: You can change or cancel your order for a full refund within 30 minutes of placing it.
- After 30 minutes: Your order is already being processed, so it can no longer be changed or cancelled. If we can accept a late cancellation, we may offer store credit instead of a refund.
- Items in transit: Once an item is on its way, either from our supplier to us or from us to you, it can’t be cancelled. If you no longer want it once it arrives, you can return it as a change of mind, with return postage at your cost. See Returns.
- Separate orders can’t be combined once they’ve been placed, and adding or swapping items can change the delivery estimate.
- Supplier delays: Occasionally a supplier is delayed, or their stock information turns out to be inaccurate. We’ll keep your order open for up to 60 days. If an item hasn’t shipped or isn’t on its way to us by then, we’ll cancel that item and refund it.
Faulty or damaged items are always covered. See Returns.
Returns
Damaged or incorrect items (within 30 days)
If an item arrives damaged or isn’t what you ordered, contact us within 30 days of delivery. We may ask for a photo, and if we need the item back we’ll send a prepaid return label, so it costs you nothing. You’ll receive a replacement or refund, as guaranteed under the Australian Consumer Law.
Change of mind (within 30 days)
We offer a refund or store credit for change of mind within 30 days of purchase when:
- you have your proof of purchase;
- the item is unused and in its original condition and packaging;
- it isn’t a sale item, special order, custom item or gift voucher.
You pay the postage to return change-of-mind items. Change-of-mind returns aren’t available for print-on-demand titles or bulk orders with special pricing.
Returned to sender
If an order is sent to an incorrect address you gave us, or isn’t collected and Australia Post returns it to us, you’ll need to pay the postage to send it again.