@Kiro: If you're talking about the whole philosophy of rewards programs as being flawed, then yes, that's certainly a possibility, but there is inherently a flaw in considering exact value propositions and the worth of things when you're talking about dollars being spent. The worth of something is subjective, a consumer either spends the money, or they do not.
There probably exists a kind of psychological manipulation that comes along with a rewards system where the more money you spend, the more money you'll get back and accrue in return. But this entirely depends on whether the customer was informed on what they were purchasing, and whether they were satisfied with it after the fact. If both those factors were met, then the rewards are icing on the cake, if not, then you might feel as though you were lead by a carrot on a stick. Either way, anything that might be considered a "deal" is relative; the answer could be to make the product cheaper, but this has no bearing on whether the rewards program would still exist.
