[michaelt]

> Like he honestly believed people weren't buying American-made because they actually favored stuff from China.

Perhaps he imagined American-made carried a 30% price premium over Chinese-made, but instead found it was more of a 300% price premium.

[fountainofage]

That's a fair interpretation. Admittedly I've known him long enough that I'm familiar with these experiences of his, so I didn't probe too much into this exact event and what he thought everyone else was doing.

He also at one point pursued a diet in which he'd eat vegan as long as it was the best option available. And it was just like ... that's almost what literally everyone else does? He seemed to believe most people just ignored certain menu options by default, versus ordering the item that seemed most appealing to them. He thought people looked at a menu and thought "oh, that eggplant vegetable medley sounds amazing! Drat, it doesn't have chicken, guess I'll just get the cheeseburger."