As a number of universities have backed away from their initial plans to reopen to face to face classes in the wake of some evidence of COVID outbreaks on campus with the arrival of students, Purdue University president and former Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels has decided to use Tullock’s Spike.
Purdue has, like many other institutions, spent the summer trying to prepare for having students back on campus. They are requiring all students to submit a negative COVID test from no more than 14 days prior to arrival on campus. They have set up labs for on campus testing, moved some classes on-line, and increased distancing requirements in dorms and public areas. All of this has culminated in something that Daniels has required all students to sign – the Protect Purdue Pledge. As part of that pledge, Purdue is requiring their students to commit to safe behavior or face punishment. In the wake of actions of other universities, Daniels announced that students would now be prohibited from hosting or attending events- read here parties- that did not have social distancing or mask wearing. Violations of that policy would be treated like stealing or illegal drug use. In short, they would expel students who go to parties.
Setting aside for a moment arguments about the relative risks that students that age face from the virus, or the likelihood of them transmitting to others who might be at risk, all I want to say here is that somewhere Gordon Tullock is smiling.
READER COMMENTS
Philo
Aug 21 2020 at 12:38pm
Enforcement likely to be haphazard and, at best, ugly.
Floccina
Aug 21 2020 at 2:49pm
Would that encourage people to lie about where they’ve been making it harder to track whom they may have exposed?
Paul Bogle
Aug 21 2020 at 4:53pm
Daniels has a record at Perdue. Tuition has stayed steady over his tenure, something uncommon. Students interested in face to face education will likely prefer these terms to a more expensive online experience at IU or another large midwestern institution.
Thomas Hutcheson
Aug 22 2020 at 7:32pm
This sounds like straight up regulation of behavior that produces externalities: infecting other people. The “spike” would be to punish the person who gets infected which does not directly discourage behavior that infects others.
BC
Aug 23 2020 at 9:10am
This measure seems more akin to fining speeding rather than Tullock’s spike, penalizing something believed to be correlated to accidents rather than accidents themselves. Tullock’s spike for Covid-19 would involve penalizing positive Covid tests or, equivalently and perhaps more easily enforced, rewarding negative tests. For example, suppose students received tuition rebates for periodically testing negative. Then, they would have incentive to (1) avoid risky behavior and (2) subject themselves to testing. The rebates could be offset by a higher pre-rebate base tuition.
Economic analysis suggests that taxing pollution is better than mandating particular technologies/methods for reducing pollution. Penalizing parties seems like mandating a particular method of slowing spreading rather than penalizing spreading itself. Just as some firms may innovate more effective ways to reduce pollution than mandated methods, some people might innovate ways to hold “safer” parties through selection of attendees, for example.
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