
Danish Researchers: A Better Way to Line Up Than 'First Come, First Served' - ColinWright
http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2015/09/lines-efficient-first-come-served/404218/?single_page=true
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everyone
It sounds to me like the researchers trials were ignoring the reason queues
exist. You dont _choose_ to go to the bank or post office (for example) at an
arbitrary time. You go because you have business which must be conducted and
you only have certain time windows available in which to go there. The higher
the overall demand for service is at this time the bigger the queue will be.

Also in the last served first system it would be possible for people in the
bottom of the stack to never be served! As long as a steady stream of
newcomers arrived.

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dnautics
Agreed.

In supermarket lines, for example, you let people choose their queue because
you can see what people have and let them judge which queue they should be in
to incentivise them to go to the queue which packs them in the most. I always
feel a bit guilty when I purchase dry ice (for science) at the supermarket
because it causes queuers to make an error in judgement as to the length of
the line.

At banks and the DMV, because there is no way to judge how long someone in
front of you is going to take, it doesn't make sense to let people choose, so
there is a single queue that is distributed at the end of the line.

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mjevans
Actually the DMV in my state works a little differently (at all of the
secondary businesses which perform that task under some state license system,
probably notary of the republic based; I never looked in to the details).

There is generally a queue for a /type/ of operation that you are doing. It's
expected that the average time to service a given person receiving that
service has only minor variation and an occasional outlying exception.

It seems that there is usually one agent assigned to each queue, and sometimes
additional agents are assigned (balanced?) as load dictates.

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pontifier
I've often thought that the root of many queues is a discontinuity in pricing.
This is most apparent on black friday. If prices were smoothed out then a
time/money trade-off can happen. Anyone can jump to the front of the line if
they are willing to pay more. This is more "fair" than last first but would
optimize revenue for the seller, and lower wait times for everyone.

Imagine: The next iPhone sale stars at $10,000. The crowd makes a loose circle
as the clock starts to count down to sale time. Just before the clocks reaches
zero, one obviously rich and important individual struts up to buy one. They
casually complete their transaction, and hold up their prize as the clock
starts counting down from 30 again.

At time=zero, the current price starts dropping $5 per second until about a
minute later the next person is willing to step up to buy it for $6k. They
walk away satisfied because of the conspicuous consumption they have just
experienced. Several more step up as the price begins dropping again at $4k,
$3750, and $3100. The envy of the crowd is palpable.

At $2560 a small swarm of early adopters breaks ranks. It's a good 20 minutes
before the price starts dropping again. As you watch the large pile dwindle
and the crowd begins to vibrate it's clear they will not be reaching the base
price today, but will instead sell out the entire inventory at some unknown
price.

As you eye the crowd, you think about how much you want it, and suddenly your
heart races as you step out in front of everyone else to get your hearts
desire.

~~~
marshray
I once tried to sell a car like this. I put an ad in the paper that said, say,
$6000 and dropped it in price over time. It didn't sell.

Years later when I went to buy a house the real estate agent explained to me
why. The market for houses (and presumably cards) include lots of people who
are watching and waiting for months or years to buy. They get into a steady
state where they only look at new listings and ignore the ones they've already
seen.

So if your house or car doesn't sell relatively quickly, you move from the
seller-arrival queue to the buyer-arrival queue. Which takes
disproportionately longer and it's likely that you won't be getting the best
price for it.

~~~
maxerickson
The incentives for the real estate agent make them think that way though. If
they sell a house for $200,000 in a week, they are probably a lot happier than
if they sold it for $300,000 in 6 months.

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smegel
> the queues are more efficient

How? Are they processing more units from the queue per second? Is it easier to
find the vague end of a line among a jumble of people than the head of a
queue? Are LIFO queues more likely to have something in them than FIFO queues
thus avoiding wait times for the next customer and idle staff? Is it a good
idea to leave a large portion of boarding to the last few minutes of the
boarding interval?

~~~
dnautics
There's probably also a pareto equilibrium illusion going on. If you screw the
one person at the bottom of the stack, but serve everyone else more
efficiency, is that 'the best choice'? Indeed, there may be no way to
rearrange the order of service so that no one is worse off, but that is not
necessarily the 'correct' optimal.

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chrismcb
The problem with this method is starvation. If you treat a queue like a stack,
and you have a steady stream of incoming people, the first person in the queue
will die of starvation before they are helped.

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peteretep
This is horrifying. Literally the fabric of society would break down.

