Two of My Favorite Topics
Tim Harford at Marginal Revolution touches on two of my favorite topics in one short post. I have written a number of times about how frequant flyer mile holders seem to come out whole from airline bankrupcies when every other creditor has to take a major hair cut. Even pensions are cut before frequant flyer mile obligations. Tim shares some ideas and a link to an Economist story with more on this topic.
What really caught my attention was when he discussed whether difficulties in getting any airline help in actually cashin in the miles was a stealthy way of repudiating the miles. In his analysis, he has this nice restatement of Coyote's Law:
Never attribute to conspiracy that which is adequately explained by
incompetence.
