No, very little of the world's commerce is predicated on 'reward economy' but on actual trade - as in people paying somebody else for a product or service that they need and often cannot source or do themselves.
Reward/loyalty programmes are entirely about retaining users/customers but making the user feel they are being provided value, but only by having the customer invest as much (or even more) that offsets the cost of the rewards. They may be some genuinely altruistic reward schemes that are balances on a slightly loss of profit is better than a lost customer but I've never come across one.
Some credit cards give you a percentage cash back, which I use, but then I pay off my credit card every month so that is a genuine win for me. It's a win for credit card companies overall though, as most people do not have a zero outstanding balance each month. Others debts are my reward.
I guess I'm still not seeing the distinction. In almost all cases, a person only gets something because the value (how much that person values the thing or service) is greater than the value of what they need to give up in order to attain it (time, effort, money or an item).
Like, no matter how poor I am, I am never going to give (trade) away something that I feel is more valuable than whatever it is that I'm going to receive in return. On the extreme end, if it's something I need to survive (IE - I'm dead if I don't get it), then it's obviously going to be more valuable than pretty much anything that I own or could provide, short of my life.
The only exception, as you noted is altruistic gifting of something of value. But even then I'd argue that people only do it because they are receiving something in return that is of greater value than what they are giving up. In this case, it's anything from tax breaks, to "advantages" (like increasing the chances of getting a scholarship or grant), to just feeling good about yourself, to atoning for some wrong you felt you did in the past, etc.
Sure, as Shifty noted, a person might not consciously think of it that way but in effect that is what they are doing.
- "Hey, look at this reward program it's great!"
- If the time, effort or cost is lower than what they believe they'll receive from the program.
- "Hey this reward program is shite! Why would anyone participate?"
- If the time, effort or cost is greater than what they believe they'll receive from the program.
- "I guess this reward program is OK?" Coin flip if the person will participate.
- If the time, effort or cost is roughly equal to what they believe they'll receive from the program).
It's still just an exchange of one thing for another thing regardless of how a person consciously thinks of it. And they are still mentally calculating if what they could get from the reward program is of greater value than what they giving up to participate in it.
I'd argue the only "bad" versions of reward programs are things like Sweepstakes that you sign up for in order to get a chance to win something. People don't often read the fine print to find out what exactly they are giving up. So they'll have the perception that they are giving up nothing when in fact they are often giving the other party the right to cold contact them via phone, e-mail, texts or letters with the worst ones containing fine print that allows to give that information to other companies so they can contact the person.
Gambling, of course complicates this as then it's all about the chances of obtaining something more valuable than what you are giving up. Since it's only a chance, I never did see the point in gambling. But there's obviously a lot of people that do see the "value" in it or are addicted to the endorphin rush of the possibility of losing everything. Similar to how people will risk their life by cliff climbing with no safety ropes or riding bikes on narrow cliff trails where one wrong move results in their death.
Regards,
SB
blog.playstation.com
I tried it recently to relive my childhood. Bleh! 
