> A common example to help explain sunk costs is the movie theater experience, where a person buys a ticket and, 20 minutes into the movie, she realizes that it is a horrible movie and it will only get worse.
Offtopic I know, but twice in my life I've walked out of a terrible movie at the theater within the first 30 minutes and gotten a refund from the manager. Don't think you have to sit through terrible movies!
That is absolutely absurd to me. I understand walking out, but getting the refund had to have caused some eye rolls and jokes at your expense after you walked out. Where does it end? Can you walk out and get a refund because you didn't like the last 20 minutes? I think this sort of speaks to the absurdity of some aspects of this "get mine" mentality cultivated among economists
One thing you might notice when traveling a lot, the US attitude towards refunds (ie. when reasonable, and I would argue even when "slightly" unreasonable in the interest of customer service) differs a LOT from most countries attitude towards refunds (which can be summarized as essentially only when convicted in a court of law - and even then)
Offtopic I know, but twice in my life I've walked out of a terrible movie at the theater within the first 30 minutes and gotten a refund from the manager. Don't think you have to sit through terrible movies!