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Ok, if this is too off-topic the Moderator will delete it or tell me to delete it.

Suppose you buy a candy bar from a vending machine and find more change in the change slot than the machine "owes" you. Do you take the extra change, or do you take only the correct amount and leave the rest? If you leave the rest, who does it belong to? The next person who finds it, the vending company, of the person who forgot to take his change and left it there in the first place?

RubenZ pointed out that the boxes of .45 ACP were mis-marked - nobody switched stickers, it was a computer error probably attributable to someone mis-keying the price. Switching the stickers would clearly be stealing. Paying the marked price, knowing it is incorrect (too low) is not exactly stealing, but may be opportunistic. I think we all agree that pointing out the error is the right thing to do, but need to understand that when we do the right thing, we do it for ourselves - for our own self-respect - not for the store, or for the greater good of mankind.

I have a problem taking the extra change, only because I know it is not mine. In reality I think this is silly - the person it belongs to is not coming back for it so the next person who finds it, takes it. If I find a wallet it will have some ID in it so I can find the actual owner. If I find a dollar bill on the sidewalk, I can not find the owner. When I was a kid there was a saying, "finders keepers, loosers weepers" to cover these kinds of situations.

Anyway, I think you are a great bunch of people and I'm glad to be associated with you. This is not a discussion most people would put up with - it would be brushed off, laughed at, and subjected to cynical, disparaging comments.

Regards,
Andrew

In Cowboy Action Shooting, they have a rule about "failure to do right" - it means that if you try to "game" the rules, even if you are technically within the rules, if the spirit of what you are doing is wrong - then you are wrong. I was always impressed with their view on this (and probably ought to give up the 3rd Sunday prone matchs to go back and shoot with the Cowboy shooters).

Sometimes though, looking around at the things people not only get away with but are rewarded for (I'm thinking of situations at work) - I find it easy to feel like a fool for behaving properly according to the way I was brought up. It does not change the way I behave, and maybe I should not feel foolish - thanks mrbug! - but sometimes I wonder where the line is, between behaving properly and being too strict.

HEMIzygote has more courage than I do. Going back to correct the mistake after the fact took guts.

Regards,
Andrew

About two years ago, at Academy, WWB 9mm was under $5 for a box of 50. I asked the counter guy for a case of ten boxes and took them to the register to check out.

Register person was clearly a temp (holiday season); scanned the carton and the register rang up the per box-of-50 price, times one. I told him "No, it is ten times that, there are ten boxes in this case" and he checked to make sure, and corrected the error.

I walked away feeling virtuous - poorer but honest. In the interim I've started to think I was a fool.

If the discrepancy would come out of the clerk's pocket, ok it was right to say something. If it would come out of the store's bottom line, then it is up to the store to pay their people enough to mark things properly, and I was stupid to correct the mistake. I'll never know.