Case Study: As Cup Dream Loses Stream, The New Kettle Is My Prize

By Jason Steger

Every armchair Sport fan has his or her dream. It might be to go to the Wimbledon final, perhaps the US Masters. Mine has always been to go to the World Cup to see English in the final.

This year, was to be the chance. With the finals in Japan and South Korea and living in Australia it seemed the perfect opportunity.

You applied through FIFA's website and the three-match package was $US330. More than I had ever paid for football tickets, but who cares?


Then came the bad news. We weren't successful in the lottery. No tickets. Should we just go anywhere and try to get tickets off scalpers?

Iran hit the phones. If property is all about position, position, position, position, getting tickets is all about contracts, contracts, contracts, and he hammered them mercilessly. It helps that he has fingers in corporate pies. We sweated on Friday's game; there was flight from Melbourne at about 10 on Thursday night so we could have made it. But still no tickets. We were a 75 per cent chance to get some, then it was 45 per cent. Then it was less than zero.

About midday on Friday, a merchant banker in Tokyo told us we could have tickets to final. For $US2200 each. Grulp. That was a lot, especially when your house needs a lick of paint and a new kettle would come in handly. And the kids could do with some warmer clothes. I didn't tell them about the scheme-they would want to come too.

What to do? The banker needed a swift answer. What was the deadline? A couple of hours, it seemed. Could we wait until there was a result from the England-Brazil quarter-final? We were told 6:30 pm was cut-off point; what happens if there is extra time and penalties? And there was still a semi-final to be safe negotiated.

A few minutes into the second half Ronaldhino chips over the England goalkeeper and that's it. England huff and puff but they can't blow the Brazilian house down. England are done by the better team. We ring Japan. Thanks, but no thanks. I am buying a kettle instead and watching the final on TV.


Questions

1. What would have been the opportunity cost for the journalist, Jason Steger, of going to see England play in World Cup?

2. Using a supply and demand model, explain why FIFA needed to ration tickets to the World Cup.

3. What method did FIFA use to ration tickets?

4. Using the same model as used in question 2, explain why scalpers were ablt to charge $UST2200 for tickets to a World Cup match when the official price for tickets was $US330 for the three matches.

4. How does this article illustrate the importance of information?

Case Study: As Cup Dream Loses Stream, The New Kettle Is My Prize