I was interested to read Matt Lichtash’s column in which he framed the plight of late-coming smoked salmon fans at the Usdan weekend brunch buffet as a “tragedy of the commons.” As Lichtash points out, Hardin’s paper argued that privatization, wherever possible, was the best solution for the tragedy of the commons. Many other thinkers (such as last year’s Economics Nobel winners) have come up with different ways of tackling the problem since then, but privatization and the price system remain the go-to solution suggested by most economists, particularly when it comes to distributing basic goods like prepared food. Price something according to how much there is of it (supply) weighed against how much people want of it (demand) and hey presto, people will refrain from taking that extra piece of delicious smoked salmon that they don’t really need because they don’t really want to pay for it.
Of course at Usdan the distribution of smoked salmon is already privatized. But instead of charging a market price for each piece of salmon, the university has worked out a contract with Bon Appétit whereby a certain amount of daily access to an unlimited all-you-care-to-eat buffet is guaranteed to every first-year and sophomore, as well as any junior and senior that wants in. By using a fixed-price meal, instead of purchasing a limited amount of food with points or (gasp) US dollars, students get to, as Lichtash says, “embark on a gluttonous rampage” every single day. Alas, most days the smoked salmon is either in short supply or nonexistent.
I understand that there are a number of concerns that have to be balanced when working out how the food supply of college students will be organized. Parents worry about their children, many of whom have been granted the right to vote before they have learned how to boil water, and want them to have a guaranteed supply of hardy cafeteria food when they get to school. If they are given all-points right off the bat, they might mismanage that money and use it to buy booze and cigarettes at WesShop (ah, the good old days–frankly, chalking and Mocon seem like poor replacements as topics of what-has-Wesleyan-come-to diatribes). I know that athletes also have higher caloric requirements and that might also be a concern if all-you-care-to-eat weren’t an option. It’s possible that giving everyone all-you-care-to-eat is more palatable from a public relations standpoint than giving athletes extra points.
Well, I’m sorry, I hate all-you-care-to-eat. When something, especially something delicious, isn’t priced, there are going to be shortages and overconsumption. I know that many environmentally-minded students lament the sight of people loading up food onto their plates like it was 2012 and then complaining about the lack of trays as they dump the food right back onto the conveyer belt. And Lichtash’s column highlights some of the other problems with all-you-care-to-eat—-for example, salmon moochers!
Rationing, which at Usdan occurs at the Kosher, classics, pasta and grill stations, is a solution only as far as standing in line is a deterrent to getting quesadillas or Matzah ball soup. In other words, it’s not a solution: people still dump as much kosher hot dog and beef stir-fry on the conveyor belt as they do vegan food. So why don’t we just price Usdan food appropriately instead of trying to ration it?
Now seniors, I know what you’re going to say: I too remember the frustration of paying five dollars for a tiny cup of fruit back when Usdan opened my first year. Well, maybe that’s what the cost of the “fresh, local fruit” that impresses our parents so much really is. We shouldn’t ask for something that we aren’t willing to pay for. So in the future, I hope that students concerned with salmon shortages will put pressure to end all-you-care-to-eat and replace it with an actual food marke
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