The American Chamber of Commerce surveyed 1,000 Mexicans in four cities, revealing some alarming figures about pirate merchandise: nine out of ten Mexicans purchase pirate materials, which costs the would-be legitimate manufacturers and retailers of such goods around $75 billion annually. It also deprives the Mexican government of about $35 billion per year. Even assuming that the Chamber of Commerce is inflating the estimates (and I don't believe that 90 percent of Mexicans regularly buy pirate goods), compared to drug trafficking, those are simply huge numbers, and pirate merchants are, in a lot of cases, closely linked to organized crime. So where's the outcry?
Wednesday, November 25, 2009
I Don't Wanna Buy Pirate!
The American Chamber of Commerce surveyed 1,000 Mexicans in four cities, revealing some alarming figures about pirate merchandise: nine out of ten Mexicans purchase pirate materials, which costs the would-be legitimate manufacturers and retailers of such goods around $75 billion annually. It also deprives the Mexican government of about $35 billion per year. Even assuming that the Chamber of Commerce is inflating the estimates (and I don't believe that 90 percent of Mexicans regularly buy pirate goods), compared to drug trafficking, those are simply huge numbers, and pirate merchants are, in a lot of cases, closely linked to organized crime. So where's the outcry?
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4 comments:
Remember that the fundamental flaw with these estimates is that they generally postulate that all pirate purchases would be replaced with legit ones if the pirated stuff wasn't available. So while obviously there's a large loss for the entertainment companies and retailers as well as the state, it's waaaay lower than what they say - and especially ridiculous when they try to apply the lens to say, China or the Philippines or something. (Although I haven't looked at this particular study, so all due apologies if the methodological rigor is unassailable.)
Yeah I was thinking the same thing. I also wonder what regular means--once a month, once a year? Not too specific.
Also, would these products ever be purchased if the buyer had to pay full US retail price? Probably not - the prospective purchasers would then never be exposed to the products.
Kiki: Great shot on your profile, where's the fish from?
There's no question that's a big hole in the logic. Taking that into account, the real number is probably a fraction of the Chamber of Commerce says, but even if it's one quarter, we're talking about a big chunk of change.
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