Why Movie Theater Lobbies Don’t Have Clocks

I had one of those conversations the other day that starts out perfunctory but leads to a profound revelation.

“Why don’t movie theaters have clocks in their lobbies?” someone asked.

It was a good question, and at the time I didn’t have an answer.  Later on it occurred to me that concessions were the reason. If there were clocks in theater lobbies, people might look at them and think “I only have four minutes before my movie starts.  Fuck popcorn, I need to get a seat.”  Without the overhanging specter of clearly visible time people are more likely to linger in the lobby and stock up on overpriced popcorn and Milk Duds.

It’s a pretty standard “do everything you can to deprive the consumer of information so he will make more irrational decisions” strategy.  Casinos use it, theme parks use it, soda companies use it—everybody uses it.  When’s the last time you saw a clock in a Wal-Mart, or a Best Buy for that matter?

I’m sure that the numbers have been judiciously crunched: without clocks concession sales go up.  In this age of ubiquitous phones with synchronized timekeeping devices, the effect is certainly less pronounced.  However, if there were no effect at all, surely some theater somewhere would stick a clock in its lobby just for raw convenience.

There are certainly small theaters out there that provide such a simple courtesy for their patrons, but the big chain leviathans (Cinemark, Regal, AMC, etc.) do not.  Again, I’m sure they’ve run the numbers on it and found it simply to be more profitable.

This is such a strange idea, that it’s okay to withhold information from people if it brings in more money.  In fact, it’s downright nefarious.  They justify it by saying that they aren’t forbidding people from finding out what time it is; they just aren’t telling them.  Okay, fine.  Still, the overall level of ignorance is increased, and I fail to see how that benefits anybody.

Whatever.  The point is a simple one, and this is the revelation that struck me like the ray of light that knocked Paul off his literal ass: we cannot trust the private sector to do what is right if there is a wrong option that is more profitable. It’s simply the nature of the beast.  You can’t expect a bear to choose a pinecone over a fish.

We all understand this on some level.  It’s why we don’t have private police and fire departments, and why our roads and airwaves are public (sort of).  Of course there are those among us who believe that everything should be privatized: they call themselves libertarians, or Austrian school economists.  They believe that private organizations invariably provide better services than public ones.  From what data they draw that conclusion is a mystery, as nobody has ever tried a broad program of privatization before.  As far as I’m concerned, it’s no less flawed at its core than communism: sounds good on paper, leads to disaster in practice.

Which isn’t to unduly praise the waste and inefficiency of government.  That waste and inefficiency, however, is often the very thing that holds government power in check.  We should all dread an efficient government more than any thing.  Efficient governments come up with ideas, and they put ideas into practice with plans, and plans become beasts of their own that devour lives according to arcane political designs.

When the blunt and impersonal “invisible hand” comes into play, though, well, you end up in a world without clocks.