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Steve Levitt is not sure whether this report is true:
In contrast to Levitt, I would think that the people on that list are extremely prone to buy things from telemarketers.
Posted by Tyler Cowen on January 27, 2009 at 12:37 PM in Economics | Permalink
Comments
Why would someone who dislikes telemarketing enough to put themselves on a do-not-call list be "extremely prone to buy things from telemarketers"? My intuition on this matches Levitt's...
Posted by: Scott Leibrand at Jan 27, 2009 1:04:14 PM
It is true, unfortunately. I'm just glad I never signed on to the list in the first place.
Posted by: Travers at Jan 27, 2009 1:08:44 PM
I'm on the Canadian do-not-call list, and I can certainly confirm that it's leaky at best.
I view being on the list as an added reason never to buy from telemarketers, and a justification for being rude to them and just hanging up-- I think much of telemarketers' traction comes from the reluctance to be rude to them, and people's propensity to keep talking until the other person lets them go.
Posted by: Jacob T. Levy at Jan 27, 2009 1:17:06 PM
> Why would someone who dislikes telemarketing enough to put themselves on a do-not-call list be "extremely prone to buy things from telemarketers"?
People who know they are easily convinced to buy stuff will surely put themselves on the do-not-call list to protect themselves from impulse purchases.
Posted by: Brian at Jan 27, 2009 1:24:50 PM
Or you could be on a do-not-call list because you want to cut down on the calls.
Of course, the drop of the last 15% (first 85% from being on the DNC) came after the foreclosure. Now no one wants to call me except family, friends, and creditors.
Posted by: Fraud Guy at Jan 27, 2009 1:31:18 PM
"People who know they are easily convinced to buy stuff will surely put themselves on the do-not-call list to protect themselves from impulse purchases."
Do you seriously think the rest of Canadians enjoy the calls? Is your time that cheap?
Posted by: Jon H at Jan 27, 2009 1:40:44 PM
I predicted that this would happen, in August 2007.
http://www.bizop.ca/blog2/telemarketing-fraud/what-is-new-with-the-do-not-ca.html
Buy an answering machine, screen your calls, and you will be better off than signaling to the world that you fear that you are a chump.
Posted by: michael webster at Jan 27, 2009 1:51:48 PM
I believe spam is one area where property rights are a great solution, Internet email being a good example. Users are free to choose email providers who block spam messages. If people could choose who provides them snail mail or phone services (which is largely becoming true due to cable and Internet providers), I think the same would be true of traditional forms of communication.
Posted by: Grant at Jan 27, 2009 2:09:09 PM
I'm a Canuck, and I'm on the DNC list, because I simply couldn't stand the constant interruptions. Of course, the old interruptions are fading away, to be replaced by a whole new set of shiny, freshly-scrubbed companies whose mission in life is to annoy me endlessly.
Software exists to block numbers on a number-by-number basis, but it requires you at least partially dedicate a computer to answering the telephone. And these companies have also learned to do round-robin dial-outs where you can never know the next new number they're calling from.
I screen, but it's an imperfect solution at best.
Posted by: Garth Wood at Jan 27, 2009 2:28:21 PM
If you are gullible enough to believe that the telemarketers will respect your wishes to not be called when you put your name and phone number on a list that is handed to them on a silver platter, you are gullible enough to believe them when they lie to you about how great whatever product or service is that they are selling.
Posted by: Doug at Jan 27, 2009 2:41:42 PM
why have a phone?
Posted by: babar at Jan 27, 2009 2:51:43 PM
As a Canadian who works in a call center (political and opinion surveys) I hold all people on the list in contempt, even though the list doesn't apply to my line of work.
I really have no sympathy for people on the list getting called. Serves them right.
Posted by: Robert S. Porter at Jan 27, 2009 3:21:36 PM
We put my mother-in-law on the U.S. list. She is in assisted living and has a very difficult time saying no and hanging up, or remembering who she has already bought things from. Being on the list has easily saved her hundreds of dollars in duplicate magazine subscriptions, etc. I'm glad Robert is so sympathetic.
Posted by: Joe at Jan 27, 2009 3:48:25 PM
I hold all people on the list in contempt
The feeling is mutual.
Posted by: Brian 2 at Jan 27, 2009 3:52:15 PM
Is the RSS feed for this site broken?
Posted by: a_c at Jan 27, 2009 4:00:42 PM
Sounds like at equilibrium we may need phone companies to act like Gmail and filter out spam.
What's next, a spam-aware phone with two different ring styles?
And the only option for older phones is to let everything in or trust the filter.
Posted by: mk at Jan 27, 2009 4:08:11 PM
As transaction costs go to zero, the amount of spam goes to infinity. It costs nothing to send an e-mail, and in a VoIP world, it will soon cost nothing to make a phone call to anywhere in the world.
There is even a nice parallel in the fact that a caller ID phone number can be faked as easily as an e-mail return address.
In virtual worlds like Second Life, where objects can be created for free, grey goo generating objects are a constant problem. Currently this is mostly it is used by griefers as a prank or denial of service, but if virtual world economies grow sufficiently in future years it would certainly be used for moneymaking purposes.
The key point involves costs literally being zero, not merely very low. Bulk postal mail costs only pennies per mailing, but because it is nonzero, mailings must be carefully budgeted and targeted.
A world where transactions take place online using electrons, as opposed to a brick-and-mortar world where transactions involve shoving atoms around, is a world of zero costs where spam will inevitably flourish.
At some point, however, some impoverished country will hit on the idea of selling Westerners a local phone number that requires long-distance charges to dial, even if it is only pennies per call. You will dial your friend who lives down the block via their Madagascar phone number. This will be sold as a value-added phone-spam-resistant service. Best of all, the billing infrastructure is already in place.
Eventually Google mail and Yahoo mail will hit on the same idea, and these will become profit centers for their respective companies.
Posted by: anonymous at Jan 27, 2009 4:18:35 PM
I'm glad Robert is so sympathetic.
Well then perhaps you should take more responsiblity for her wellbeing.
Posted by: Robert S. Porter at Jan 27, 2009 4:42:24 PM
Robert, perhaps you are a troll.
Take responsibility for her well-being, indeed. That's why we got her on the list - a much easier way to enhance her well-being than the tedious process of canceling subscriptions, insurance contracts, health club memberships, book clubs, and so on. It's not like we have unlimited time to see to her well-being, on top of the the time we already spend handling her finances, taking care of her appointments, driving her around on errands, helping her manage her medications, etc.
I suppose we could cut her off from the outside world entirely by canceling her phone, but social isolation wouldn't exactly enhance her well-being. Or maybe we should monitor all of her conversations real-time, giving up our personal lives so that telemarketers are not in the least inconvenienced.
Posted by: Joe at Jan 27, 2009 5:20:17 PM
Joe, perhaps you just want the heavy hand of government to destroy a legitimate marketing and sales tool. It is not the purpose of the government to create lists of exclusion which harm low-income people and students.
Posted by: Robert S. Porter at Jan 27, 2009 5:56:44 PM
The feeling is mutual.
Yeah, I bet you're one of those polite people who likes to swear at retired women and students. If you have a problem with getting phone calls, cancel your service.
Posted by: Robert S. Porter at Jan 27, 2009 6:00:31 PM
I expect most of the people on this list - probably the vast majority - are simply annoyed by telemarketers. But I bet the list does contain a substantial number of impulse purchasers and people who emotionally find it difficult to say 'no' to strangers.
Posted by: MikeF at Jan 27, 2009 6:03:29 PM
If I have a problem with door to door salesman, do I have to sell my house? Can't I simply not allow them on my property? Don't people have a right to decide who may use their own property (i.e. their own phone, and the phone line they lease)? If you call someone who has informed you (via the list) that they do not want you to call, how are you any better than a tresspasser or stalker? Aren't you using their property in a way you are not authorized to use it?
Being a telemarketer is harrassment, an imposition, and despicable behavior. It is not justified by the fact that you are a retired woman or a student.
Posted by: Doug at Jan 27, 2009 6:19:16 PM
Robert do you really believe that telemarketing is a valuable service to the world? Do you believe this about email spam too?
If you do you're in a tiny minority, most people view these as unwanted intrusions, which we're not quite sure how to get rid of without breaking the good features of an open phone/email system.
I'm surprised we haven't yet seen spam filtering phone services: it wouldn't be that hard for a phone company to filter calls, using blacklists and whitelists, and routing unwanted calls to voicemail. No doubt this will soon be a new front in the spam wars. Perhaps the phone companies will be more receptive to using charges to deter spam, as unlike email the framework to do so already exists. I'd happily sign up for a plan which charged every new number to call me 50c for the first call.
Posted by: improbable at Jan 27, 2009 6:19:20 PM
"a legitimate marketing and sales tool"
Funniest thing I have heard all day. If it is such a legitimate tool, then why do telemarketers have to resort to spoofing their caller ID information? I'm a Bell subscriber and their telemarketing pops up as 000-000-0000.
Posted by: Vincent Clement at Jan 27, 2009 6:42:02 PM
