Talk:Pyramid scheme

Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment
This article was the subject of a Wiki Education Foundation-supported course assignment, between 10 January 2019 and 18 April 2019. Further details are available on the course page. Student editor(s): Cgome166. Peer reviewers: Ncons009, Rvale045.

Above undated message substituted from Template:Dashboard.wikiedu.org assignment by PrimeBOT (talk) 07:31, 17 January 2022 (UTC)

Unsustainable?
Business, all of it is a Pyramid scheme. Who can deny this? Mc'Donalds doesn't work as a Pyramid, really? -- Nevermind, just read that they usually do not include services or products. I remember working for a company my parents called a "Scam" but I actually made a few bucks, they sent out the products for free and gave me a cut of the sales.

One has to understand the difference between morality and ethics to edit this page correctly. Morality, simply put is something that is ALWAYS wrong no matter what. Ethics can or cannot be wrong depending on the type of action or thought in or out of a particular environment.{car salesmen often sign the back of car titles to expedite the sale and this is accepted in the industry[ethics]even though it is immoral[it's always wrong to sign someone else s name without power of attorney among other things]. Just because something is unsustainable doesn't mean it's not immoral and/or unethical. Making money is not wrong if it follow proven legal parameters. If people engage in the practice of investing in the person, place, or thing, knowing full well that at some point the last people to join and pay the entrance fee and/or the one time cost at their beginning of participation will loose everything they invest, then that is a pyramid scheme. It can even be a product or a service but here again I would argue that the product or service would have to be bogus[but believable enough to trick/fool some. It's always wrong(immoral) to take advantage or exploit others for whatever any reason;therefore illegal. It seems to me that this page could be a target page for pyramid schemer s'. People who would like to perpetuate this heinous act on others have a vested interest in keeping this page as vague as possible. - so NOT unsustainable for it could be something bogus that lasts several generations(if the people that participate die before others join the pyramid then in my view, is sustainable) t'was the big argument over the investments in Idols, religious dolls and/or depictions of made up things [that were bought and sold]then later science proved these to be false or untrue, hence the word scheme.


 * I have caught this page with false arguments. Pyramid schemes tend to work (it's space-time just playing out) presuming "players" of "scheme" or "methodology" or getting paid. Persons are playing off the fallacy of equivocation to illicit negative thought in relation to how the word "scheme" is used in the term. There is a difference between a pyramid scheme, which is a business model for generating profit (which sometimes pans out profits, thus it being a useful "model" or "scheme" to perform business) vs. a Ponzi scheme. - Dennis Francis Blewett (February 6th, 2022) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 205.213.104.120 (talk) 21:24, 6 February 2022 (UTC)

Gifting clubs addition - removed for discussion
Gifting Clubs that could be legitimate are often confused with illegal pyramid schemes or Ponzi schemes. In Canada there are two governing bodies CRA Tax Act and the Criminal Code enforced by the RCMP  which define how a windfall is to be treated and how a "pyramid scheme" is illegal. Both of these governing bodies define the conditions that make certain gifting clubs legal or illegal. In Canada, if a gifting club is compliant with the CRA windfall criteria and adhere to the eight criteria, then the gifting is legal and not declared as income. Most decriers of gifting clubs call this a loophole when in fact it is the law. The second legislation, the Canada Criminal Code, is enforced by the RCMP. The criminal code characterizes a pyramid or ponzi scheme as illegal because it promises unrealistic returns  on an investment. The investor is enticed to continue to roll over their investment and returns without realizing that the returns are non existent and their investment gone. Again, this is illegal. Gifting clubs that do not promote an investment, have a structure that is compliant with both the Canada Tax Act and the Canada Criminal Code may be legal. It is incumbent upon the potential participant to investigate any club they want to be associated with.

Discussion
I removed the above paragraph that was added here, because it was added without concern for the rest of the article content. Looking closer, it looks like the editor's personal opinions not verified by the references offered. --Ronz (talk) 16:44, 20 January 2018 (UTC)

Dear Wikipedians, I would like to cite the MLM business Herbalife as an example of a pyramid scheme. Any opinions on that?

Chart under "Comparison to MLM"
Anyone else find this chart a bit off-putting? It might be my personal opinion of MLM's making me a bit biased, but this chart puts MLM's in a really positive light, when realistically they are more of a pyramid scheme variation. Especially when we have data that 99% of participants end up losing money. Raskalnekov (talk) 20:13, 1 May 2019 (UTC)

I believe this chart violates NPOV.Virgilthirty (talk) 23:38, 28 May 2019 (UTC)

I also think the statement " Multi-level marketing (MLM) companies operate as pyramid schemes and consumers often confuse legitimate multi-level marketing with pyramid schemes." is very confusing. It calls MLMs pyramid schemes, then says legitimate MLMs are "often confused" with pyramid schemes. I don't think the critics of MLMs are confusing them with pyramid schemes, they are contending that they ARE pyramid schemes and that MLMs should not be considered legitimate at all. Is there a way this could be reworded? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 104.142.126.219 (talk) 03:17, 16 April 2022 (UTC)