Twenty years ago, [Yale Law School professor Ian] Ayres published a landmark study proving that women got hosed at car dealerships. (The study has since been twice updated, with similar results.) On average, women were offered list prices $200 higher than prices quoted to white men. (Black women fared even worse — they were quoted prices $400 higher.) Ayres argued that women who pay inflated prices are so lucrative to dealerships, and account for such a huge chunk of commissions, that dealers are willing to let savvier customers go just to court these customers. Let’s say you’re the rare female buyer who actually does her homework. You walk onto the car lot confident and informed, asking all the right questions. The salesman will probably still offer you a lousy deal. “That’s the perversity of it: He may be willing to sacrifice your sale in order to charge higher prices to all women, just to make sure he doesn’t miss any home runs,” explains Ayres. “It’s a search for suckers.
