In particular, there are two kinds of naivety from which we’re determinedly immune. First, while this book certainly doesn’t hold back from criticism of the financial services industry, we don’t believe that practices in financial services are much worse than in other major sectors of the consumer economy. For reasons we’ll consider, we think there has been more marketing in most other sectors, but we don’t think that much of it has been better. It seems to us that in a competitive world where it’s increasingly difficult for firms to behave with transparent fairness and still make profits, sustain their share price and hit their bonus targets, a lot of opacity and unfairness are all too common. Whether it’s car builders cheating emissions tests, or international corporates creating elaborate structures to duck local taxes, or digital media owners channelling advertisers’ money to terrorists and paedophiles, or just supermarkets injecting chicken breasts with water to increase their weight and price, there are a great many more pots than kettles. And these examples, of course, have all broken the golden rule ‘Thou shalt not get found out’: how many others still remain unknown?

首先，虽然这本书并没有阻止对金融服务业的批评，但我们不认为金融服务业的做法比消费经济的其他主要部门差得多。出于我们将要考虑的原因，我们认为大多数其他行业的营销活动都有所增加，但我们并不认为其中有多少是更好的。在我们看来，在一个竞争激烈的世界里，公司越来越难做到透明公平，仍然盈利，维持股价，实现奖金目标，很多不透明和不公平现象太普遍了。不管是汽车制造商欺骗排放测试，还是国际公司制造复杂的结构来逃避地方税，还是数字媒体所有者把广告商的钱转嫁给恐怖分子和恋童癖者，还是超市给鸡胸注射水来增加重量和价格，壶比壶多得多。当然，这些例子都打破了“你不应该被发现”的金科玉律：还有多少人仍然不为人所知？