Ratios

The Denver Colorado Police Department Monitor has determined that Denver police do not arrest off-duty police for DUI if there is not a crash. How can this be determined you may ask?

For a given period of time all DUI arrests of Denver police officers involved crashes. For the general public only 1/3 of the DUI arrests involved crashes. For Denver police DUIs in other cities only 1/4 of the arrests involved crashes.

Ratios can be used in an infinite number of ways to monitor activities and to minimize losses.

A new parish priest in Waterbury CT determined that there was theft. Over the years he had noted a stable ratio by dividing the total offering by the number of people in the parish whether they attended services or not. The deviance did not point to a suspect but alerted him to a problem.

I have always been amused at people wanting to own a laundromat so that they could have all cash income and thus evade taxes. There is a water bill for a certain number of gallons and each washer uses a certain amount of water. There is a ratio between washer loads and dryer loads. Revenue calculation is quite simple.

Records need to be kept and thought given to what ratios can be calculated and what they mean. Where possible extra records should not be required. The priest did not count attendees at each Mass. The offering was already known and the number of people in the parish was known. The number was no as important as the consistency or as he found a lack of consistency.

Quick test. How can you tell if a tire has low pressure when you do not know what the pressure should be?

Answer: Check the pressure in all the tires. Most will have the same pressure. Any deviance will be a low tire.

David Sneed