The rich pay less

Last night, here in Jardins, we bought this delightful Chicco cot-cum-playpen. Also two Avent dummies and a pair of light shoes to protect Sam's feet from the cold floors in our unheated flat. Of course it all cost a fair bit, maybe £200, but actually less than in other places, including "poorer" areas. You get the feeling that the richer areas often have better prices, perhaps not for coffee and cake, but for quality items like this which savvy shoppers could find elsewhere if necessary. We have bought too many crap quality baby items in this town, which still cost a lot but invariably turn out to be unfit for purpose. I wrote a blog post some time ago called something like "Being poor is expensive in Brazil" and our latest shopping trip seems to confirm that what's really going on here is as much to do with access to information and choice as with the simple rich-poor divide. And since we all now live in an information society, it is this poverty of choice which leaves the lower income households in even greater disadvantage. Snobbery has no place in a modern society, but quality and price are central to a functioning, free market.