Government All Up In Our Panties
I once participated in a really fun string of chain mail. You got a letter telling you to put your name at the bottom of the list and to send a pair of panties (in the size by the person's name) to the top person on the list.
I still have the orange lycra thong underwear I got from that. When I see them, I smile, thinking of the fun way I got them. (I think it was called "The Panty Parade!", or something like that. Fun, fun, fun!)
Well, there's an article in the LA Times noting that the "holiday gift exchange" Facebook post is "technically an illegal scam." Here's a version of that: 
Jessica Roy writes in the LA Times:
It sounds harmless. But it's illegal.The U.S. Postal Inspection Service -- the law enforcement arm of the post office, which, yes, exists -- classifies this sort of exchange as an unlawful chain letter. The classic version of this scheme just asks to send cold hard cash, but gifts count too.
"A chain letter is a 'get rich quick' scheme that promises that your mailbox will soon be stuffed full of cash if you decide to participate. You're told you can make thousands of dollars every month if you follow the detailed instructions in the letter," the Inspection Service website says. "They're illegal if they request money or other items of value and promise a substantial return to the participants."
Note "other items of value" in that last sentence. Title 18 of the U.S. Code of Federal Regulations, Section 1302, the Postal Lottery Statute, considers this whole gift exchange thing a violation of the law, punishable by up to two years in prison. (It does note that mailing items of negligible value in this manner, like postcards or recipes, is not against the law.)
There's also a logistical problem with these gift exchanges. If you invited only six people to the gift exchange, and they invited six people the next day, and so on, within 11 days every person in the United States would be a part of it. In two more days, every single person on Earth would be involved in your gift exchange.
"Chain letters don't work because the promise that all participants in a chain letter will be winners is mathematically impossible," the Postal Inspection Service notes. This is how pyramid schemes work too: by promising riches in exchange for recruiting more people to join.
Finally, there's a privacy issue: The follow-up instructions on how to participate in the exchange ask you to put down your name and mailing address. You can't know who will end up with that information. Potentially giving out your address to strangers is just a bad idea.
Guess what: Any person with $9 can get your address off the Internet.
As somebody put it in the LAT's comments:
zzyzx12
It's actually an intelligence test. Anyone who falls for it automatically fails.
I think the government should let "grown ass adults" decide whether they wish to make a gamble or not. The fact that they can cage a person who participates in this is rather sick.
And don't be too quick too assume they won't. Maybe they want you for one thing but can't make a charge stick -- so, perfect, there's that chain letter you sent.
And frankly, the government runs plenty of its own scams -- like the lottery, which is disproportionately played by the most poor and desperate people in our society.
What I know: You're statistically wildly unlikely to win. Because of that, I only allow myself to buy scratchers when I run out of half 'n' half and have to walk to the liquor store to get some -- which happens about once every six months.
Even then, I know it's a losing game, but I enjoy scratching the things off and seeing if anything matches, so I'll buy one or two then. I haven't kept count, but I'd guess I'm probably down $50 in lifetime purchases of scratchers.
Hey, wait -- shouldn't somebody or a bunch of somebodies from the government be in jail? You know...for all those TV commercials suggesting "riches" are actually possible a lottery ticket buy -- when it's probably statistically much more likely that I would become a goat farmer with her own show on ESPN.
I'm all for letting grown-ass adults do anything they like.
At the same time, things like this are (at the very best) misguided and silly and (at worst) scams to a greater or lesser degree. As this particular iteration explicitly says, 'It all depends how many ladies join', and in this particular version of the pyramid delusion, as the postal inspectors note, there only have to be a very few steps in the pyramid - about 10 - before it requires every single woman in the world to be involved.
Schemes like this always end up with lots of people who can't do math at the bottom of the pyramid sending large amounts of value to a very few people at the top of the pyramid - to the one person who started it or the people who are in the first layer or two. The pyramid always peters out at 4 or 5 layers, and the last people in get nothing. When done for money, this scam is as old as the hills.
So, while grown-ass adults can do whatever they please, I don't think it's inappropriate for the postal inspectors to tell the public the truth about these schemes, as a matter of crime prevention. The fact that the participants are sending 'gifts' and not cash doesn't change the fact that it involves large flows of value heading from large numbers of people to small numbers of people, based upon a delusion that cannot possibly be fulfilled. I think that there's a place for criminal sanctions for those who initiate these kinds of schemes.
llater,
llamas
llamas at December 15, 2016 3:27 AM
The freedom to be a victim in a con game is not one I'd fight for.
The pyramid/chain letter scheme guarantees lots of victims who get
nothing.
Contrariwise, a lottery ticket returns an average of 50% over the
(very) long term. Since the profits go to the state, the ticket
represents a self-imposed tax of about half of what you pay for it.
Ron at December 15, 2016 6:00 AM
"The pyramid/chain letter scheme guarantees lots of victims who get nothing."
At some point, one has to ask: why does this happen? How long has our educational system been so crappy that so many people don't comprehend this very basic bit of math? I lived in Ft. Lauderdale back in the 1980s, when there was a large elderly population there. And I saw so many of them falling for every scam imaginable. There was a reason why it was sometimes known as "Fraud Lauderdale"; the con people flocked to South Florida because they knew there were a lot of easy marks there. And these were people who had been through grade school prior to or during WWII, when our public education system was supposedly a lot better than it is now.
It raises the question: how far does society have to go to accommodate the needs of its least competent citizens? Because doing so always seems to involve imposing costs, and limiting freedoms, for the more capable members of society. I'm pretty libertarian when it comes to gambling, but a lot of people who engage in pyramid schemes don't realize that they are gambling -- they think it's a sure thing, and the person running the scheme does everything to reinforce that perception. It's false advertising. On the other hand, the victim is often drawn in by appealing to their senses of avarice, jealousy and entitlement. So they aren't totally innocent either.
Cousin Dave at December 15, 2016 6:47 AM
With a chain letter, come on -- there's a possibility we'll get nothing in return. I sent the panties I bought off knowing that, and was surprised to get the orange pair in the mail.
Amy Alkon at December 15, 2016 6:49 AM
It raises the question: how far does society have to go to accommodate the needs of its least competent citizens? Because doing so always seems to involve imposing costs, and limiting freedoms, for the more capable members of society.
This is the thing.
And the fact that it is illegal -- which few people know -- doesn't stop chain letters. It just allows the government one more way to snag you and throw you in a cage, if that serves their purpose.
I just talked to a researcher at a party who had the FTC after him -- not because he did anything wrong, but because they didn't understand or try to understand what countless scientists across the globe attested to: that his product was scientifically valid, per the tests. (It cost $6 and he never made any money on it -- he did it through his university -- but he was forced to personally pay a $75K fine, simply because they decided they'd bring it down on him. People do this to advance their own careers. Sometimes, they go after someone actually guilty. A lot of times -- and I've seen this happen with two other friends who are scrupulously honest in their (scientific) business -- they just want the win, even if it's a "win" against someone doing nothing wrong.
Amy Alkon at December 15, 2016 7:01 AM
and was surprised to get the orange pair in the mail
Yes, and you were supposed to get between 6 and 36, so...
CD writes
a lot of people who engage in pyramid schemes don't realize that they are gambling -- they think it's a sure thing
Oh, it is a sure thing if you're at the top of the pyramid. The rest of you suckas, err, investors, well good luck.
Or to put it another way: Free Bernie Madoff!
I R A Darth Aggie at December 15, 2016 7:32 AM
Cousin Dave wrote: At some point, one has to ask: why does this happen? How long has our educational system been so crappy that so many people don't comprehend this very basic bit of math?
As long as adults were unable to pass on basic math skills to their children.
I'm reminded of the "KardashianKard," a prepaid debit card which bore the imprimatur of America's First Family. The card itself cost $100 (with an additional "activation free" of $60), carried a monthly fee of $7.95 and managed to charge the bearer for basics like a balance inquiry. A small price to pay for the vanity of using a card endorsed by a celebrity urinal.
It raises the question: how far does society have to go to accommodate the needs of its least competent citizens? Because doing so always seems to involve imposing costs, and limiting freedoms, for the more capable members of society.
I assume we'll find out during the next generation. I'm not hopeful.
Kevin at December 15, 2016 8:28 AM
The idea of a stranger on a random list buying me underwear is kinda creepy.
Conan the Grammarian at December 15, 2016 9:55 AM
I wasn't going to go there, but since CtG did, I agree that the underwear thing is deeply, deeply creepy. I almost-automatically suspect that there's a pervy motive somewhere in there. Funny, I would have though that goils would be even-more attuned to this, and would not participate. Maybe I knows less about teh goils than I thinks I does.
llater,
llamas
llamas at December 15, 2016 10:32 AM
Cousin Dave: "On the other hand, the victim is often drawn in by appealing to their senses of avarice, jealousy and entitlement. So they aren't totally innocent either."
Now why, Cousin Dave, Why did you have to bring Democrat voters into this discussion?
charles at December 16, 2016 12:58 PM
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