If your store happens to be close to an army base, do you just accept the disadvantage of giving away part of your profit?
No they just raise the base price for everyone.
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thericofactor@sh.itjust.works 2 days ago
I’m not from the U.S., but why would people from the military get a discount? If you do that as a store, why not doctors and nurses too? Why stop there and why not include firefighters, government workers or teachers?
And who compensates you as a business owner for these giveaways? If your store happens to be close to an army base, do you just accept the disadvantage of giving away part of your profit?
It sounds pretty stupid. People should get paid enough to pay full price for their stuff. Especially by the government. Especially in a country that allocates an enormous part of their GDP to their military.
Notyou@sopuli.xyz 2 days ago
CaptPretentious@lemmy.world 2 days ago
I could be wrong here… but around the George W. Bush administration + 9/11 and the government painting everything they do as something to protect “against the terrorists!!!” that’s when a lot of things started happening.
That’s when the view of the military seemed to flip and it’s just been stuck that way. Movies like Top Gun were made as a PR stunt to make the military look better. The same is for basically every cop show out there: make cops look like the good guys. Anywho, every company went out of their way to really show “how much they support the troops” by giving a discount. And every smooth-brain started saying “THANK YOU FOR YOUR SERVICE” every single time. The hero worship was/is real, and it shouldn’t be, and it’s a real problem. (Totally different conversation, but it’s led to an influx of people joining the military, or trying to, who really shouldn’t). Before Bush + 9/11, I don’t recall military discounts outside of, like, businesses that were owned/operated by vets.
vaultdweller013@sh.itjust.works 2 days ago
I’ve heard that some food joints would offer military discounts back when people were figuring out how bad Vietnam was especially with how many vets were coming back broken and homeless. Theres at least one place near me that’s had a veterans discount as far back as '78, they also let folks camp out in their parking lot since it was a bit bigger to accommodate the firetrucks since they were in a more central location than the fire station at the time.
Rambling aside, veterans discount started out as a way to help conscripted veterans during and after the fustercluck that was Vietnam and then was hijacked at some point.
CaptPretentious@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Ah. So possible it was cranked up to 11 (no pun intended) after 9/11. That, or its frequency illusion, and I just never noticed really before a certain point.
vaultdweller013@sh.itjust.works 2 days ago
Hard to say without digging up when different places adopted it but I wouldn’t be the least bit surprised.
DragonTypeWyvern@midwest.social 2 days ago
Military discounts have been a thing for longer than that. Couldn’t tell you when it started.
Vupware@lemmy.zip 2 days ago
Many Americans have an uncanny reverence for the military and those who served. I guess that reverence seeped its way into many a retail store’s management.
I think it’s just about optics for the most part.
Jankatarch@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Teachers did actually get benefits in my country until 2016. It was a pretty decent system.
kamen@lemmy.world 1 day ago
“Land of the free, home of the brave”, but with the caveat that those other professions don’t qualify as brave enough is my guess.
Patches@ttrpg.network 2 days ago
why not doctors and nurses too? Why stop there and why not include firefighters, government workers or teachers?
Some places do this.
Who compensates you
In a round about way - everyone else. Though it’s possible you just make less profit 5% of the time.
ShinkanTrain@lemmy.ml 2 days ago
It’s plain old jingoism. Just point and laugh at it.
faerbit@sh.itjust.works 2 days ago