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Comment by Incipient | Hacker News Reader

>knowing people’s spending and saving behaviour

Uhh. I passionately don't want mega corporations to have this information about me - European or not. My bank has it, but even then I'd rather they didn't!

If companies can trivially identify people bad at saving...that won't end well.

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> If companies can trivially identify people bad at saving...that won't end well.

Pray elaborate. How do you see the consequences? I can see many possibilities.

Intensification of the already powerful psychological warfare waged on regular people to separate them from their money and concentrate it in the hands of those with enough wealth to engage in this kind of psychological warfare.

https://doctorow.medium.com/https-pluralistic-net-2024-12-17... > The less money you have in your bank accounts and the more you owe on your credit cards, the lower the wage the app will offer you.

Dyamically-adjusting (higher) pricing to take advantage of your spending problem, for one.

I think the most obvious negative outcome would be advertisers, particularly those running scams, directly targeting those who are bad at saving.

Why is that a negative outcome (not in the case of scamming)? The advertiser makes a sale, and the customer gets something that they find value in. It's a win win situation.

It's kind of like intentionally targeted advertising of alcohol to alcoholics and recovering alcoholics.

Probably not explicitly illegal to do, but an unethical move that props up social harms for no constructive reason.

Why is that a negative outcome? The fisher gets a fish, and the fish gets a delicious worm offered directly to it.

Sales for payday loans, or 40%+ personal loans, etc. Any sort of exploitation that can be aimed that that person.

In general, advertising seeks to manipulate. It is not at all based on trying to link people’s needs and wants to those who provide that.

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