Ha! The thief works for them. But honestly, each time we rent a car, A and me negotiate anew whether or not we should buy the top-up (usually similar in price to what we pay for the car for a whole weekend) in order to reduce the excess from 600 to a mere 100 quid. We never do in the end. And we never needed it so far. And the betting also works a great deal on fear, I think: Usually the rental guy says to me in a low voice: »You know...600 Pound is a lot of money...«. And when I helped a friend buy a computer, the salesperson kept telling her what could (and probably would) go wrong and that she should get 12 months trouble shooting for the price of ten, cause I wouldn't always be around to help.

Dear Nicolas: Re: bike rental, are all tourists 'suckers'? http://www.nicolashoening.de/?blog&nr=84 *Why pay attention? My background: NATIVE New York City cyclist. Have had bikes stolen. Even Kryptonite locks have NO INSURANCE in New York City. Grad school. Use to live near Columbia U., which is in poor minority area, Harlem, NYC, USA. *Why is this important? AIG, Wall Street, and 'failure of rating agencies' about CREDIT CRISIS. Sub-prime BAILOUTS cost governments AROUND the world! http://www.costbenefitanalysis.org/glossary.htm Adverse Selection : principle that says that those who most want to buy insurance tend to be those most at risk, but charging a high price for insurance (to cover the high risk)will discourage those at less risk from buying insurance at all When a negotiation between two people with asymmetric information restricts the quality of the good traded. This typically happens because the person with more information can negotiate a favorable exchange. This is frequently referred to as the "market for lemons." Strategy: question the clerk! if you were I, would you buy insurance? my 'police clerk friend' will tell me how many bikes stolen? how many? poker strategy: even if the clerk WANTS TO TELL YOU THE TRUTH, his boss is watching with a camera. Assume he wants to extract the most money from a 'tourist', sucker. Most bike rentals are inferior. Asymmetric information tends to limit quality of products exchanged, adversely selecting the lower quality cars/bikes. Strategy: get your bike from a local person. Eat at a Chinese Restaurant, where the family owns and EATS there. *** Strategy: screening http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/economics/laureates/2001/public.html Stiglitz showed that an uninformed agent can sometimes capture the information of a better-informed agent through screening *** http://yuchaoyingjoan.wordpress.com/page/2/ Solutions to asymmetry information: 1. Hidden actions: The principal develops incentive contracts (Mechanism) 2. Hidden types: the informed party can use signaling while the uninformed party can use screening Analogous Case Study: Used Car Trade: Seller proposed warranty/build reputation (signaling). Buyer do a mechanic check on the car (screening) Hurricane Katrina and U.S. failure of levees in New Orleans. Authorities, even the U.S. President 'knew nothing.' quote: "Doing heck of a job, Brownie." These 'flood cars' (electrical wiring will rot out) are sold AROUND THE WORLD. Summary: the fault is yours. Seller did NOT signal quality. Buyer did NOT do proper screen test - contact police for records of rental bikes stolen because of inferior lock. *suggestion #1 use psychological technique. "Good cop, bad cop." I heard a rumor that your locks are easily broken. Is that so? My good friend here really wants to recommend bike tour to the entire hotel (made up a good story.) *Why does "good cop, bad cop" technique work instead of 'forensic science.'? *Factoid: 80% of crimes in America solved by 'confession.' Not sure whether that includes 'torture.' Handbook of interview research By Jaber F. Gubrium, James A. Holstein *suggestion #2: Add an additional lock and resell it. *suggestion #3: rent bicycle from students, who NEED the money. students cannot easily 'flee' like criminals. *** Does America have an insurance problem? Over 40% including 'working poor' have NO MEDICAL INSURANCE.

Why do intelligent persons who design PSO and OTHER algorithms make easy suckers? http://www.kyivpost.com/nation/30791 1.)intelligence in one area does not mean intelligence in ALL areas. 2.)lack of understanding of psychology of self deception. Florida, Walt Disney World. lots of fog. Some drivers SPEED UP, since cars 'seem far away.' 3.)many do NOT know that they do NOT know. http://www.fooledbyrandomness.com/ http://www.fooledbyrandomness.com/imbeciles.htm The Black Swan: Quotes & Warnings that the Imbeciles Chose to Ignore 4.)Nobel Prize winners are geniuses at FAILURE. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/When_Genius_Failed When Genius Failed: The Rise and Fall of Long-Term Capital Management "Weapons of Financial Mass Destruction" - Warren Buffet.

Boaters in tourist areas Killer may receive punishment of 60 hours of service, NO jailtime. Confirmed danger to public, including driving on wrong side of road. Highly public tourist areas near Tampa, 2 hours from Orlando, Walt Disney World. former governor of Florida is Jeb Bush, the younger brother of current President George W. Bush. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jeb_Bush Some call the disasters under President Bush, lack of caution or 'disregard of insurance.' New Orleans Flood; Iowa Corn Belt flooding; California LA wildfires; Credit Crisis; Iraq and Afghanistan and Pakistan; etc. http://www.tampabay.com/news/publicsafety/accidents/article899388.ece Man gets careless driving ticket in St. Pete Beach crash that killed woman By By Leonora LaPeter, Times Staff Writer Published Tuesday, November 11, 2008 3:43 PM ST. PETE BEACH — The driver of a van that ran off Blind Pass Road last April and killed a woman has been charged with careless driving. The traffic citation carries a fine of $141 to $500 and up to 120 hours of community service. Rimar was driving his van on Blind Pass Road just before noon April 10 when he veered onto the sidewalk in front of Fortunato's Italian Pizzeria and struck Seth and Heather Whalley, who were visiting from North Carolina. Heather Whalley, 33, died two days later. "It certainly seems woefully inadequate," said Seth Whalley, a 34-year-old chemist who lives in Massachusetts with the couple's three children. "I don't know what else to say about it. I guess I'm feeling speechless." Rimar has been issued 21 traffic citations in Pinellas County, including speeding, running a stop sign and driving on the wrong side of a divided highway. St. Pete Beach police investigator Robert Micklitsch said he gave Rimar the ticket Monday after he learned last week that State Attorney Bernie McCabe would not file criminal charges against Rimar. Rimar had several prescription drugs in his system, prosecutors say, but toxicology tests showed they were at "therapeutic levels." Since he was not impaired and he wasn't driving recklessly before the accident occurred, prosecutors said they did not have a criminal case against Rimar. Rimar, 35, said Tuesday he could not comment on the case at the request of his attorney. *** The Law of Higher Education By William A. Kaplin, Barbara A. Lee Page 204 British tourist sued car rental company ... from the United States, created a special duty, said that court, to warn the foreign tourist of "foreseeable criminal conduct" ... *** Perhaps an extreme example. But the 'rate of medication' in the U.S. is quite high compared to the world. The rate of 'BIG GAS GUZZLERS' is quite high compared to bicycle riders.

Thanks for all the input, newyork (Though the last stuff is a bit too much here, I guess :) Though you can always win by screening (I'll look more into that research, thanks for the hint), and I should be intelligent enough to devise a scheme for such a situation, it is a problem that you just can't do it all the time, because then you have no life. Somewhere, at some point you will have to trust people to save time and effort. That is a real optimization problem I am also thinking about here. Granted, I could have had a better instinct why this would be a market that is to be approached with caution. But I hinted in the article why I think I was fooled.