Tag: inefficient allocation

Community — Chicken Finger Shortage

Chicken fingers at the school cafeteria are a hot commodity! People are racing to the cafeteria to get them and demand is high, but they often run out before everyone can be served. If prices were higher then fewer people would want chicken fingers and there may be enough for everyone to get some, but instead, a shortage ensues. The original fry cook skims some of the tenders to give to select people, an example of inefficient allocation.

A group of close friends decides to take over the operation (like in a mafia movie) so that they can determine the allocation of this scarce resource. This group begins skimming the fingers as well and reselling them to others in the school at higher prices so that they can profit from the shortage.

Thanks to Sarah Corrigan for the clip recommendation!

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Superstore — Gift Wrapping

 

Garrett is on gift wrapping duty at the store and he hides his inability to wrap gifts under the guise that it’s inefficient. While economists may see gift giving, in general, as inefficient, gift giving inefficiencies are scattered throughout television and movies (Blackish, Brooklyn 99, John Mulaney’s Stand Up, Life in Pieces, and Old School). In this scene, Garrett focuses on the wasted time that it takes, beyond just getting the gift, that goes into wrapping a gift only for the wrapping to be destroyed later.

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John Stossel — Price Gouging

Is price gouging evil or is it the sensible economic decision when shortages arise? In this series, John Stossel explores price gouging around natural disasters. This topic is really good for discussing the tradeoff between equity and efficiency.

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Jingle All The Way: Elasticity of TurboMan

Howard (Arnold Schwarzenegger) tries to get a coveted TurboMan action figure doll the day before Christmas. It’s only the hottest selling toy of the season, so everyone is in a rush to grab this item. Because prices aren’t (initially) adjusting in their usual way, a shortage occurs across the entire city.

A limited shipment of Turbo Man action figures does arrive at one store, which decides to allocate the doll through a lottery system. Whenever there are shortages in markets, there may be a misallocation of consumption, particularly when items are distributed randomly rather than to the consumers with the highest willingness to pay. Even the though the price of the doll increases by 100%, there doesn’t appear to be any change in the quantity that people want to purchase. This would imply that the demand for TurboMan action figures is very inelastic.

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Blackish: Gift Giving

The Johnson’s Christmas has changed a bit, but it looks like the children still don’t appreciate the gifts they were given. Junior perfectly demonstrates the inefficiency of gift giving by noting that his parents took money he could use anywhere and turned it into money he could only use at one store.

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