An Economic Eye

From my Pyne dorm room I distinctly hear the festivities known as Princeton Reunions picking up. Since I am conveniently located in the middle of the 5th, the doors of my building — and of my bathroom — have been unlocked. It’s sure to be a mess, but a fun one. Welcome to three full days of free beer!

How does the University justify subsidizing all that beer anyway?

In economics, a classic case for subsidies is positive externalities. When the marginal social benefit of a good — say, beer consumption — exceeds the marginal private benefit of that good, Pareto optimality can be achieved by subsidizing each unit of the good in the amount between the marginal private benefit and the marginal social benefit at the optimum quantity (i.e. the quantity at which marginal social benefit equals marginal social cost).

But what are the social benefits of beer above and beyond the private benefits?

A Princeton professor of mine once suggested camaraderie as a positive externality of beer.  That’s certainly a possibility.

Another possibility, which falls more or less the same vein, but is somewhat more amusing to consider: loose men and women. You’d be surprised who looks OK — hot even — when you’ve a couple too many beers in you. That douche-bag riding on his mommy’s shirt-tails may even strike you as appealing if you’ve strong enough beer goggles on.

And who knows, maybe the douche-bag will turn out to be a good guy the next morning. Coffee from the Wa? Yes please! I’m convinced that’s what the University is hoping for. It seems the mission of Princeton Reunions is only a very slight modification of the official mission of Taglit Birthright.

Q: What is (Princeton Reunions)
A: (Princeton Reunions) founders created this program to send tens of thousands of (Princetonians) from all over the world to (Princeton) as a gift in order to diminish the growing division between (Princeton) and (Princetonian) communities around the world; to strengthen the sense of solidarity between (Princeton) and (Princetonians) throughout the world; and to promote the idea of a trip to (Princeton) for all (Princetonians)  as a critical part of (Princetonian) life outside of (Princeton).

Like Taglit Birthright, Princeton Reunions unite many of their respective participants in coupledom. Rumor has it that if you marry someone you meet on the Birthright trip, Taglit will give the two of you a free honeymoon… in Israel. On campus, meanwhile, we’ve all heard the stats: 2/3 of Princetonians marry fellow Princetonians — and most of those couples get together at reunions.

This year, some attempts at creating connections appear to be a bit more overt. Take, for example, the Singles Mingle, which begins at 8:30 pm tomorrow in the beautiful Chancellor Green. Here, “all single alumni are invited to . . . come meet other single alumni and make new connections.” A little surprising that the event is sponsored by the Class of 1979. Maybe it should read, “Newly-Divorced Singles Mingle”?

But all you shy (or lazy) singletons out there, rest assured. Even if you don’t have the energy to mingle at the singles event in Chancellor Green, you — and everyone else on campus — will be benefiting this weekend from one of the positive externalities of beer. After all, our University is wise enough to correct for the positive externality by issuing a full subsidy. So, expect a campus full of “liberated” men and women.  Sorry Mom, you aren’t the only one to have experienced the culture of the 60s.

A delightful explanation of one kind of love — in differential equations–, courtesy of yesterday’s NYT:

“Romeo’s behavior was modeled by the differential equation dR/dt = aJ. This equation describes how Romeo’s love (represented by R) changes in the next instant (represented by dt). The amount of change (dR) is just a multiple (a) of Juliet’s current love (J) for him. This equation idealizes what we already know – that Romeo’s love goes up when Juliet loves him – by assuming something much stronger. It says that Romeo’s love increases in direct linear proportion to how much Juliet loves him. This assumption of linearity is not emotionally realistic, but it makes the subsequent analysis much easier. Juliet’s behavior, on the other hand, was modeled by the equation dJ/dt = -bR. The negative sign in front of the constant b reflects her tendency to cool off when Romeo is hot for her. Given these equations and an assumption about how the lovers felt about each other initially (R and J at time t = 0), one can use calculus to inch R and J forward, instant by instant. In this way, we can figure out how much Romeo and Juliet love (or hate) each other at any future time. For this elementary model, the equations should be familiar to students of math and physics: Romeo and Juliet behave like simple harmonic oscillators.”

That’s beautiful.