TITLE:
Optimal Apartment Cleaning by Harried College Students: A Game-Theoretic Analysis
AUTHORS:
Amitrajeet A. Batabyal
KEYWORDS:
Apartment, Cleanup, College Student, Nash Equilibrium, Static Game
JOURNAL NAME:
Theoretical Economics Letters,
Vol.7 No.5,
August
1,
2017
ABSTRACT: In this note, we use a
simple game model to analyze the optimal cleanup of an apartment that is shared
by n∈N college students who are pressed for time. From an
individual standpoint, these students dislike cleaning. However, they also
prefer a clean apartment to a dirty one. Hence, for any student i, where i =1,…n, this student’s
utility is the total number of hours spent by all the n students cleaning less a threshold d times the hours spent cleaning by himself. In this setting, we
first determine the Nash equilibrium cleanup times when the threshold d is less than unity. Second, we find
the Nash equilibrium cleanup times when the threshold d is greater than unity. Finally, for specific values of n and the threshold d, we investigate whether the second Nash equilibrium is Pareto
efficient.