Saturday, November 12, 2016

The Principal Agent Problem


I have not had the opportunity to witness this principal-agent model too much because the jobs that I worked at never really had any of these issues worth talking about regardless of the lack of exposure to this issue I have witnessed this a couple of years ago when I visited my uncle in Scotland and worked part time at his amusement park. This park was divided in two parts; one part was filled with animals you could look at and even feed some and the other half was filled with a track for ATVs and some slides that little kids could go through. The main issue that took place there was with people complaining that the staff was being rude to them for not letting them either pet all of the animals or ride the ATVs faster than what the limit was set on them. These measures were set in place as a safety measure for everyone and the managers understood that the staff was just doing their jobs and took our side most often although in front of the customer they would side with them to show them that they cared. Although this relationship worked for many years one summer when I was working at the park there was an incident that happened. There was a change in managers over that summer and some of them wanted to start to make the rules less restrictive because they believe that those safety measures deterred a lot of people away from coming to the park but a group of the old managers still supported the old rules put in place. Well within two weeks there began to be a lot of confusion amongst the staff regarding what to do. One of the new rules was to make the ATVs less restricted and faster. That was a main issue for a lot of the staff because we realized that doing that would mean it becoming less safe for the visitors so no one really did anything with that until one day when one of the new managers went down to the ATV area and told us to take off the restrictions because the park was losing money since people wanted the ATVs to go faster. That day a kid came to go on the ATVs and although we instructed him to go slow at first in order to get a feel for the ATV and only after a while to ramp up the speed. Well he started alright but quickly panicked and instead of hitting the break he accidently hit the acceleration throttle making him accelerate off of the track and into a creek that was nearby. He ended up with a broken arm, broken leg, and some broken ribs. A helicopter had to come pick him up and take him to the hospital because the injuries were that serious. This incident caused a lot of stress for everyone working there because they didn’t know what to do and what to say when the parents threatened to sue the place for being unsafe for children. We were in trouble because we followed the orders of one of the managers but the written rules were still the same as before in regards to the restrictions of the ATVs. Gladly the other managers realized what had happened and the lack of communication that was going on lead to a life threatening incident. The manager that decided to change the rules without going through the process was quickly terminated and the park paid the family for the lawsuit. In this case the staff was also disciplined because it was also our fault for listening to one of the managers without receiving a physical change of rules or being briefed by everyone beforehand. Personally after this incident and all of the stress it has put me through I learned to always question things and to make sure that before I make a change to something that it is alright with everyone else as well and before I take orders that involve big changes such as this to make sure that I am protected by following these changes by seeing something written or being instructed to do so by a collective of managers.

3 comments:

  1. In your title you write Principle while in your first sentence you write principal. These are two different words with different meanings. Here the correct usage is principal.

    Also, you have one big blob of text instead of several paragraphs. I wonder why. Similarly, several of your sentences run on and on. Having shorter sentences would be better. You need to edit this stuff some after you initially produce the text. Doing so shows some concern for the reader.

    The story you told is interesting. Ultimately it seems that customers don't really know what they want. Ahead of time they want the thrill of riding fast. After the fact they want safety and elimination of accident risk. That tension leads to the triangle problem you describe. Other markets demonstrate something similar. For example, the subprime mortgages that were issued a decade ago to borrowers who had poor credit ratings and who were taking out loans equal to the purchase price of the house offers an interesting parallel.

    A big deal issue is whether the market can self-regulate on this. It matters for that about who ultimately bears the risk. From your story it sounded like the owners of the amusement park bore at least some of the risk, by making a payment to the family of the kid in accident. Under that circumstance, perhaps they will have the diligence in the future to prevent rogue managers from relaxing the safety rules.

    One other point. I didn't know what ATVs were. So I Googled it and see they are all terrain vehicles. The first time you used the acronym, you should write out fully what it stands for.

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  2. I think that the scenario that you brought up was extremely interesting because the moral hazard was in a way a legal one as well. I'm sure many amusement parks are posed with these same issues with their regulations, but I always assumed that these regulations were necessary for legality reasons. Clearly with the negative backlash that the park received from the community and family the regulations were important.

    Overall I think that this was an interesting take on the principal-agent problem that I think would be unique to the rest of the class.

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  3. I think the new management was a bit foolish to ease up on the regulations, and in any corporate situation I can see this causing a triangle-like scenario. Not everyone is going to be on-board with making a situation more dangerous.

    Taking the speed restrictions off of the ATV's is dangerous and it should not have been allowed. Can you imagine if safety regulations weren't being enforced at an amusement park, it would get shut down instantly. I think this company should be investigated by someone and potentially shut down for putting lives in danger to make a few extra bucks.

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