Banker’s Dozen
By Barry Ritholtz - December 15th, 2011, 10:30AM
December 15, 2011 Urban Word of the Day: Banker’s Dozen
The opposite of a Baker’s Dozen where the customer receives 13 of a product for the price of 12; in a Banker’s Dozen the customer receives 11 of the product for the price of 12.
Hector was surprised to find only 11 glasses in his gift of 12 glasses that he received from the bank. Later, Hector learned that the Bank offers a Banker’s Dozen in their gifts and products, in which they steal one item.
via Urban Dictionary
hat tip @pkedrosky
Tweet
Facebook
Reddit
Digg this!
December 15th, 2011 at 10:40 am
Nuke Gingrich (nuk GING-gritch)
When trying to get attention, a politician makes some terrifying prediction about the future, that is absurd…
http://gizmodo.com/5867205/newt-gingrich-is-bizarrely-terrified-of-a-fake-sci+fi-weapon
December 15th, 2011 at 12:51 pm
11 glasses of which 2 are broken and one has been lazed with cyanide – thats your bankers dozen.
December 15th, 2011 at 12:55 pm
Regarding Gingrich; I am now even more convinced that Terrorists have created ‘liquid stupid” and have tainted our water supply…some, like Gingrich – are quite hydrated.
December 15th, 2011 at 2:00 pm
Then there’s the mutual fund manager’s dozen — you get 12 donuts, but each has a bite taken out of it.
December 15th, 2011 at 2:01 pm
Hmmm….. when my bank gave me a dozen glasses, they actually sent me a postage-due note saying that I had received a dozen glasses that were waiting at the bank for me. However, when I went to the bank, they had loaned the glasses to another bank to give to their customer in the same way and told me that I could pick them up next year. They were kind enough to send me the invoice for the shipping and handling charges to pay.
December 15th, 2011 at 2:02 pm
I like the story (questionably true, though) of the Baker’s Dozen as insurance against punishment for cheating:
From wikipedia’s entry on “Dozen”:
A baker’s dozen, devil’s dozen, long dozen, or long measure is 13, one more than a standard dozen. The oldest known source, but questionable explanation for the expression “baker’s dozen” dates to the 13th century in one of the earliest English statutes, instituted during the reign of Henry III (1216–1272), called the Assize of Bread and Ale. Bakers who were found to have shortchanged customers (some variations say that they would sell hollow bread) could be subject to severe punishment. To guard against the punishment of losing a hand to an axe, a baker would give 13 for the price of 12, to be certain of not being known as a cheat. Specifically, the practice of baking 13 items for an intended dozen was insurance against “short measure”, on the basis that one of the 13 could be lost, eaten, burnt, or ruined in some way, leaving the baker with the original legal dozen. The practice can be seen in the guild codes of the Worshipful Company of Bakers in London.
However, there is some doubt over whether this is the real explanation for the expression, because baking 13 instead of 12 units has been good practice all over Europe, not only in England.[citation needed] It also seems unusual that only bakers deliver 13 in a dozen, and not, for example, butchers. An alternative explanation for why specifically bakers deliver 13 in a dozen has been found in the tidy way 13 disks (loaves, cookies, biscuits, etc.) can pack a rectangle (baking tray) of appropriate proportions.[citation needed] Packing trays have a 3:2 aspect ratio, and the most efficient two-dimensional array is hexagonal close packing, which has sixfold symmetry, such that each baked item is equidistant from its six nearest neighbours. The corners of a cookie sheet heat up and cool off faster than the edges and interior, so any item placed near a corner will not bake at the same rate as the other items. A 4+5+4 arrangement provides the dense hexagonal packing while avoiding corners, and would have been discovered empirically by bakers with the goal of baking the maximum number per batch with optimal uniformity.[citation needed]
According to the 1811 Dictionary of the Vulgar Tongue, by Capatin Grose, a Baker’s Dozen is “Fourteen; that number of rolls being allowed to the purchaser of a dozen”.[8]
December 15th, 2011 at 4:10 pm
Barry, you are doing the country no favors by perpetrating the notion that bankers are all bad actors. There are tons of bankers in S&L and small banks around the country doing honest and ethical work.
Stirring the rabble with accusations that all bankers are bad is similar to the cries of the Europeans in the 30s, accusing the Jews of causing their economic issues instead of blaming the politicians that had failed them. These kinds of vigilante cries are extremely dangerous and lead the nation away from the real problems.
You are part of a great lie being formed by people unwilling to hold the poor government leadership responsible. Obama has a list of criminals in the FCIC report in his hands, described in detail on a 60 Minutes article – Bush era crooks!!! Many of the crooks are in the 1%. What is he waiting for? What is the media waiting for? Is 60 Minutes the only people in the land willing to ask the hard questions?
I know a few bankers – these guys are disgusted with the big bank behaviors, and they’re being forced to up their FCIC insurance to pay for these crooks’ behavior. Don’t paint them all with the same brush.
That’s a convenient lie to let Obama and his cronies off the hook.. Bankers are not all crooks. It’s a small %.
Why not do some research into what is holding the prosecutions up? Foment some real anger at the right people instead of protecting your favorite party. You always cite me as partisan – you need to hold yourself accountable, bro.
December 15th, 2011 at 7:58 pm
Except the Vampire Squid which would keep ALL the glasses and send you an account statement instead. The glasses have been hypothecated.