Companies giving in to customers vs. the US economy

[theredbaron47]

Regarding the thread on CS about the man at Ikea who got a $70 for $50 off due to a misprint and a manager giving into his demand for honouring the original price:

Does anyone think that small instances such as this add up in such a way that might be affecting the US economy?

Another way of saying it, do you think that stories like this coincide at all with the US economy being in a recession now?

[CancelMyService]

I don't know about the overall economy, but I know from firsthand experience that giving the store away to placate SCs will lead to individual stores (or whole chains if it's "policy") going out of business.

Computer City was well known to be the "yell and get what you want" capital of my area. I personally saw the store managers GIVE computers to people who would scream just to get them out of the store. That was in the days where even an entry level system was like $2500 so that was a major hit to the bottom line.

[Seshat]

Yes, I do. Unfortunately, I don't have the economics background to be able to explain the chain of effects and figure out the resultant effects. On an instinctive level, I think 'yes, of course, it HAS to have an effect'.