if you drop the gambler’s presentation of kelly, and just maximize expected log utility, you immediately get the correct answer for the “win or die” scenario. the second scenario lightly touches on kelly, and would also be aided by considering the situation as log utility maximization. (expenses going out every month like clockwork, decision is work (small guaranteed return), and/or how much to allocate to various bets.)
some of your concerns in the last post can also be modeled properly.
Having been a part-owner in an analytical chemistry lab, this attitude continues amongst workers to this day.
No shortage of folks who didn’t want to wear closed toe footwear, didn’t want safety glasses, would move compressed gas cylinders unsafely, or fail to secure them, etc.
(There were minimal time pressures on the staff; we were more concerned about mistakes that ruined entire batches of work rather than how long anyone took at a given task.)