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It seems obvious. You arrive at the checkouts and see one queue is much longer than the other, so you join the shorter one. But, before long, the people in the bigger line zoom past you and you've barely moved towards the exit.
When it comes to queuing, the intuitive choice is often not the fastest one. Why do queues feel like they slow down as soon as you join them? And is there a way to decide beforehand which line is really the best one to join? Mathematicians have been studying these questions for years. So can they help us spend less time waiting in line?
The intuitive strategy seems to be to join the shortest queue. After all, a short queue could indicate it has an efficient server, and a long queue could imply it has an inexperienced server or customers who need a lot of time. But generally this isn't true.
[...] Once you're in the queue, you'll want to know whether you made the right choice. For example, is your server the fastest? It is easy to observe the actual queue length and you can try to compare it to the average. This is directly related to the mean and standard deviation of the service time via something called the Pollaczek-Khinchine formula, first established in 1930. This also uses the mean inter-arrival time between customers.
Unfortunately, if you try to measure the time the first person in the queue takes to get served, you'll likely end up feeling like you chose the wrong line. This is known as Feller's paradox or the inspection paradox. Technically, this isn't an actual logical paradox but it does go against our intuition. If you start measuring the time between customers when you join a queue, it is more likely that the first customer you see will take longer than average to be served. This will make you feel like you were unlucky and chose the wrong queue.
So, before you choose a queue to join, put the screaming kids down and carefully note the average serving time in each queue, measure the queue length, and then project which will get you through to a completed transaction quickest.
(Score: -1, Flamebait) by Ethanol-fueled on Monday May 08 2017, @10:07PM (3 children)
Without failure, the person in front of me always has some rude stupid-ass problem. They got the wrong size bag of popsicles for the sale and we have to wait for somebody to fetch the right one for them. They pull out 50 coupons and challenge each expired one regardless of its validity. They don't know how to work the fucking chip-thingy and have to have somebody work it for them.
Compounding this problem, in larger stores at least, is that the Jew management have required a manager's key to do damn-near anything useful on the register, including something as simple as voiding a transaction, because muh lost pennies from the 0.0000000001% of employees who go rogue and commit fraud. So, when previously, the cashier hit a snag they could suspend or void the transaction and wheel the others through more quickly before restarting with the problem customer. Now they just make everybody wait, because do to things the older and faster way requires a fucking act of congress and takes the same amount of time anyway.
On the road it's usually the same kind of obnoxious dickhead, usually driving something like a Prius with Hillary or Bernie 2016 stickers on the back, who drive super-slow in traffic and let everybody else and their mom in front of them (people who don't deserve to be let in, the ones who lurch ahead in the fast lane and then try to merge 5 lanes right at the last minute to get to their off-ramp). If it weren't for limp-dick weenies like those Prius drivers, there'd be a lot less incentive for everybody else to drive like douchebags. If a motherfucker tries to pull that shit on me then it's a game of chicken, and they always lose. That's my fucking lane and if you're one of those cheatin' assholes, then you ain't gettin' in. Maybe the pussy behind me will let you in there, and I tend to stop pretty abruptly in traffic, so you'd better be at least as good a driver as I am, or else dickheads will keep cutting in front of you.
You can do all these fancy-schmancy multithreaded queue simulations and quantify things all you want, but what almost always gets your line ground to a standstill are dumb fucking douches and, just your luck, one of them is right in front of you!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 09 2017, @01:43AM
Worse yet was Christmas shopping at K-Mart. After waiting 20 minutes the old lady in front of me was buying 50 cans of cat food, then complains that the price should be 8 cents less per can. The cashier starts scanning each can to delete the purchase, then scan each can again manually entering the price. After about 10 cans I left, and left the cart in line. I only shop at Amazon since then.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 09 2017, @01:59AM
We're just forsaken, it's the universes way of putting us in our place. Never happens when I have time, only when I'm in a rush.
Or I go to the bank and it's the same deal; Some jesting, mongoloid retard arranging their life finances with the counter clerk during my lunch break. Always the person one or two people infront of you. And they never appreciate how rude they are until you slam them right in their stupid, insolent face. Amirite?
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 09 2017, @02:16AM
> Without failure, the person in front of me always has some rude stupid-ass problem.
Its called karma. You may not ever lose that +1 default post score here, but God is making sure you pay the price for all that shitposting anyway.