21 Of The Biggest "Silent Scams" Society Just Accepts

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7 days ago

Recently, I came upon a post from Reddit user Sweet_Programmer_592 on the popular Ask Reddit page that looked kind of interesting. In it, they asked, "What's a silent scam in society that everybody just accepts?" and whew, were the answers varied. Here are some of the best:
"Subscription-based EVERYTHING nowadays."
"Health insurance. It's all made-up numbers. 30,000% mark-ups. But hey, you save with insurance! All you have to do is pay $250 a month plus the entire $6,000 deductible for it to even kick in..."
"Health insurance and the fact that dental is separate."
"Paying tax on a used car (or used anything, really)."
"Taxpayer-funded research that is patented and privatized as soon as it yields results, and then is sold back to the same taxpayers that funded its development."
"Shrinkflation: Companies quietly reduce product sizes but keep prices the same, so we pay more per unit without realizing it. It's accepted as normal inflation, but it's really a sneaky price hike."
"Almost literally everything now. Everything that used to work, flawed or otherwise, is now a grift. Nothing functions correctly, companies don't sell or make things people want, nothing that used to work and last can work and last now because in order for the company to make more money this year than last year, they need to sell you another one."
"Megachurches being tax-exempt. They're allowed to meddle in politics, help sway elections, and all kinds of other BS, but get to reap billions of dollars tax-free."
"Timeshares."
"Ticketing fees. When you buy tickets online, extra fees get added for things like 'processing' or a 'service fee.' Everyone just accepts them, but it's basically paying more for an automated service."
"Taxpayers subsidizing ballparks and stadiums."
"The cost of funeral services."
"Pop-up ads. You use my bandwidth to tell me blatant lies about things I don't need."
"Tipping. It's the employer's role to pay their employees fairly."
"Paying to park at a place for which you also pay admission."
"I'm shocked no one has said credit scores yet; the three credit monitors/clearinghouses are publicly traded, for-profit companies."
"Taxes. The IRS knows what 99% of Americans owe, and annual reconciliation is a 100% scam that H&R Block lobbyists bribe Congress to maintain. Both Obama and Trump publicly wanted it reformed, but both were rejected by well-bribed Congress."
"I hate that every few months or years it seems I need to call my phone provider, garbage company, cable, car insurance, and threaten to leave to get them to lower my bill, or switch to a new company to get 'new member pricing.' It's beyond annoying."
"YouTube reviews and demos."
"Rounding up at checkouts so that corporations can use our donations to cover the overhead of the charitable organization associated with their business, while also using those 'donations' to get themselves massive tax breaks."
"Cars. Can't really be a member of modern society without one in most places, and they are extremely expensive, extremely dangerous, extremely loud, and one of the worst sources of air and water pollution."
Got any "silent scam" observations of your own to share? Tell me all about it down in the comments. I want to hear it all!