Campus

OF MARGINAL INTEREST | Finals Season: A Series of Unfortunate Economic Fallacies

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Finals week can bring a lot of things to the surface: the sudden motivation to learn everything, a seasonal caffeine addiction, an awe-inspiring general state of self-loathing. After barely making out alive from seven finals seasons, I have come to realize that finals week also brings out the economically irrational agent hidden in all of us. Here I have listed a few principles of behavioral economics, applied to the disaster that is Cornell finals week (special thanks to Karna Malaviya):
Hyperbolic discounting
Finals season is always a time of personal reflection and contemplation. A question I frequently find myself asking in the days and hours leading up to exams as I panickedly squish months upon months of complex content into my brain is: why am I like this? The answer?

Olympics Week

OF MARGINAL INTEREST | An Olympian Feat: the Economics of Hosting the Games

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As we speak, college students worldwide pull out their shotskis and ice luge molds in celebration of the most riveting quadrennial exercise in patriotism, team spirit, and demolition of self-worth—the Winter Olympics. This year’s games are being held in Pyeongchang, South Korea, a city of 40,000, of which only 35.6% were interested in the Winter Olympics, according to a survey taken last April by the South Korean Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism. While the Games have proceeded swimmingly and the drone light show/technical precision/flagbearers (I’m looking at you, Tongan flag man) of the opening ceremony were spectacular, the potential $13 billion price tag for this year’s Olympics has raised some questions, particularly as Rio, host of the 2016 Summer Olympics, still faces $40 million in debt. Between Rio and Montreal, which took 30 years to pay off debt from its 1976 Olympic Games, a valid question can be raised: why do countries even want to host the Olympics? And when they do, how does it work out for them economically?

Life

OF MARGINAL INTEREST | On the Shot

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Ah, syllabus week. The time to lounge around with friends, partake in that Tuesday karaoke night at Loco, embark on that spontaneous trip to Niagara Falls with your friends—these are the good days. Unless you happen to be in bed with a 102-degree fever, curled up in a nest of blankets/scarves/bathrobes, alternating between passing out and silently cursing the gods while watching Seth Meyers: A Closer Look reruns.The latter, unfortunately, was my sad destiny this past syllabus week as the influenza ravaged my frail, defenseless body. A fate perhaps easily avoided with one little shot, offered for free at various locations on Cornell’s campus. ***
The vaccine market: a unique one within the pharmaceutical industry, revolving around shots administered once or twice a year to patients who are not yet actually ill.

Food Week

FOOD WEEK | A Closer Look at Mexico’s “Green Gold”

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While I will never understand 90% of the logic behind the store layout of Ithaca’s Wegmans (e.g. why the dried noodles must appear in seven separate aisles), I will admit that the Wegmanites got one thing right: the strategic placement of the avocado bags. Their perpetual position in a giant wooden crate by the entrance has permitted me to develop somewhat of an avocado dependency in recent years. When life gets too hectic to prepare actual complete meals, avocados are an easy fallback: they go well with the Holy Trinity of college-kid staples (eggs, easy mac, and bread), and they are green, bestowing any meal with the appearance of health and nutritional balance! My symbiotic relationship with the avocado encountered its first major roadblock a couple of weeks ago when I strolled into Wegmans and saw three horrifying numbers: $5.79 for just four little avocados. Whereas this was old news for most Cornellians, I had spent a semester abroad and hadn’t been tracking the ascent of the cost of my favorite green fruit.