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Comment by chiefalchemist | Hacker News Reader

> Perhaps the Waffle House is just a well-run company?

Forgive me for sounding cynical but I'm going to play Devil' Advocate and ask: Are they well run, or opportunistic?

In an area hit by disaster any mom & pops are likely going to be slower to reopen. They have to wait for the insurance company. They have to worry about the homes and family. Etc.

WH on the other hand can finance themselves while they wait for the insurance cheque. The out of town employees don't have local home and local family worries. Etc.

WH might be well run. But they might also simply be in the best position to rise to the top in disaster areas.

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What exactly is your problem with them helping? What do you think is wrong with it? Do you think they should stay out of business because other local businesses have to? How does that help anyone? Their suppliers, customers, local employees, relief workers, other businesses?

I said " but I'm going to play Devil' Advocate and ask:"

Translation: There's another way WE can look at this. I'm not taking sides. I don't care about the WH one way or another. If you have a problem with the idea(s) tabled then address those ideas. That's all.

Put another way: Don't shoot the messenger.

I am addressing your ideas - they're cynical, selfish, and unnecessarily assume the worst in people who are working hard to help others.

https://xkcd.com/1432/

Whwn did facts become "my ideas"?

If you want to dispute WH's advantages over M&Ps in the context of disaster, please feel free to do so. Just keep in mind I don't own the truths listed.

You are inches away from a sudden lightbulb moment that people's ability to have a positive impact is not that closely related to their intentions.

It isn't cynical to claim they are being opportunistic as much as it is myopic. If you want all recovery efforts to be done by gloomy stoics who are clawing back at a lifestyle stolen from them by cruel nature while telling heartbreaking stories about how hard it is to rebuild ... that will miss the opportunity that the situation will be quickly and dispassionately sorted out by some faceless corporation exasperated that its profits are down.

People like to think of capitalism as some sort of siphon system moving comfort from poor to rich, but it is a very powerful stabilising force. If there was an economic equilibrium and a disaster breaks it, letting capitalism happen will restore most of the status quo extremely quickly.

Saying that that is opportunistic is simply framing a positive thing negatively. If people are happy to do something out of their own self interest that is better than them doing it out of a sense of charity; and much more sustainable.

Didn't we already try the bread and circuses thing? Capitalism is exploitative by definition, civilizations lasted longer that it has existed so how "stabilizing" it is is certainly not a given, in fact there's evidence for the exact opposite. Capitalism doesn't "restore equilibrium", it dictates it, it's authoritarian and non-merit based.

Capitalism is the private ownership of capital. That's the definition.

Capitalism is also 100% merit-based and unauthoritarian. Nobody is forcing people to use Amazon or McDonalds or Walmart. You might be confusing it with socialism, which is authoritarian as hell and has no regard for merit...

> Capitalism is also 100% merit-based and unauthoritarian.

Except for inherited wealth, government subsidies and large-business-friendly tax cuts, and regulatory capture (among many other examples)?

Even for people who believe in capitalism as a religion, that statement is a bit too much.

Damned if you do, damned if you don't?

They "only" have about 2.1k locations in the US - one outlet per 163k people in the country. This doesn't seem to me like a "mom & pop"-killer. (Subways has 24k locations, as a point of comparison.)

To be clear, I did NOT call them a mom & pop kills. I said that __in the context of a disaster__ WH has an __obvious__ and distinct advantage over M&Ps.

If you'd like to discuss and/or address that, please do.

> Forgive me for sounding cynical but I'm going to play Devil's Advocate and ask: Are they well run, or opportunistic?

If they helped you during a disaster would it matter?

If you understood what"play Devil's Advocate" meant would you have still left this comment? SMH

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