Innumeracy - Do People Really Pay $45,000 for a Halibut Charter?

Innumeracy.com, defines innumeracy as

A term meant to convey a person's inability to make sense of the numbers that run their lives.

The New Literacy, linked on the site, by Lynn Arthur Steen expands:

...Innumeracy hurts in other ways as well. For example, public policy issues may increasingly move beyond the intellectual grasp of citizens who lack appropriate skills in quantitative reasoning...

Listen to this excerpt from an APRN report on a lawsuit over Halibut Charter allocation cuts in Area 2C. I think it is a good case of innumeracy , not only with the person giving the numbers, but also the reporter who doesn't question the them. (Click the yellow button)

APRN Report on Halibut Charter Cuts excerpt by AKRaven

In this audio Charter Halibut Task Force spokesperson Kimberly Tebrugge says:

Eleven people filed affidavits with the lawsuit saying that they’ve had cancellations and the total for that just eleven people were half a million dollars.

My ears perked up immediately. Eleven people. Half a million dollars.

[LATER: MPB comments "I think the reporter might just be a poor writer-- do the numbers add up if the "11" refers to the collective losses of the 11 plaintiffs rather than 11 clients?" I think she got it right. Actually, this was a radio piece, I did the transcribing. But this makes more sense. There were a few more examples that I didn't add in here and so it probably adds up to half a million for those eleven. The sentence is not the greatest but I should have caught it after listening to it a couple of times and writing it out. So I apologize to Ms. Terbrugge and the reporter. And thanks MPB for catching it. I've put this comment here because it totally changes the things. I'm tempted to take the whole post down, but I guess it's a good warning to me to be more careful. And to my readers to not assume I got it right.]

Ten people would mean $50,000 each. Don't even need a calculator for that if you are numerate. Eleven people would be $45,454 each.

Bells and whistles should sound for anyone who is thinking. $45,000 to go halibut fishing for a couple of days?!



In this audio Charter Halibut Task Force spokesperson Kimberly Tebrugge says:

Eleven people filed affidavits with the lawsuit saying that they’ve had cancellations and the total for that just eleven people were half a million dollars.

My ears perked up immediately. Eleven people. Half a million dollars.

Ten people would mean $50,000 each. Don't even need a calculator for that if you are numerate. Eleven people would be $45,454 each.to go halibut fishing for a couple of days?!

A quick Google search got me to the Charter Halibut Task Force website with links to the lawsuit they filed. Here, from their very own Memorandum of Support of Plaintiffs' Motion for aTemporary Restraining Order and/or a Preliminary Injunction

The evidence of serious and ongoing harm to Area 2C charter operators is irrefutable. Larry McQuarie, an Area 2C lodge operator, states in his affidavit that 26 regular clients have already canceled existing reservations for the 2008 season because of the one-fish limit, and that 10 additional clients chose not to book with his establishment for the same reason. The 26 cancellations alone represent a loss of $98,970.00 in gross revenues. See Exhibit 1. Scot Van Valin, also an Area 2C lodge operator, has already lost even more. Mr. Van Valin has had 40 regular clients cancel their 2008 reservations because of the one-fish rule. He had refunded $147,800.00 to those clients. Thirty-two additional regular clients have also decline to book respectively.

So, if "26 cancellations alone represent a loss of $98,970.00 in gross revenues" that's more like $3,800 per person, a number that sounds a lot more reasonable than $45,000.

How could Terbrugge give such an outrageous number, especially when they had the more accurate numbers in their Memorandum of Support? Why didn't the reporter question the outrageous number? I would argue "Innumeracy," We just say and hear these numbers without thinking about what they mean.

If she had said each charter cost $45,000, people would have perked up and said, "That can't be right." But when eleven people are lumped together to get $500,000, people don't do the simple division that would result in the $45,000 figure and don't say "That can't be right." Innumeracy. Think how much we miss when it takes more than one mathematical operation.
For example. Do you know how many acres Potter Marsh is*? People talk about acres all the time. A wild fire burns 30,000 acres. ANWR is 19,049,236 acres. How many people have a clue how big that is? But we just let it pass by without even thinking. And so people can use totally ridiculous numbers and we have no idea. Innumeracy.

The second part of the audio gets into the economic impact to the Southeast and other parts of Alaska. Terbrugge talks about all the other businesses that will be affected and the story's implication is that all this money will be lost to Alaska. But wait a minute. If you read their legal documents, you find out that the fishers aren't canceling their trips altogether, but rather they are moving from Area 2C to Area 3A.

The experiences of these Area 2C charter operators are corroborated by the affidavits of their colleagues and competitors in Area 3A, who have received booksings from clients lost by Area 2C operators. Rex Murphy states that he has booked three clients for this year who have told him that they moved from Mr. McQuarrie’s Area 2C Sportsman’s Cove Lodge because of the one-fish rule. See Exhibit 8. Finally, Donna Bondioli has had three groups of fishermen book with her in Area 3A buisness for the first time. These new clients stated that they had moved from Area 2C to Area 3A because of the one halibut limit.

So, where are Areas 2C and 3A? Another Google search finds an old UAA Institute for Social and Economic Research (ISER) report with a map of the Halibut Management Areas.




Assuming the areas haven't been changed since this report came out in the 1990s, it looks to me like they are moving from one part of Alaska to another, so Alaska isn't really losing all that money. Though the businesses in Southeast are.

So, when you hear numbers being thrown around and words like acres, don't just space it. Ask yourself, "Do I know what this means?" If not, write it down. And then figure out how big it really is. What the numbers really mean. Ask if it makes sense. Before long it will become a habit. Get numerate!

*Potter Marsh is 450 acres.