Climate Change
So I was listening to an old planet money podcast while playing a game on my DS, and it got me thinking. The game was a model of climate change: there are six players who, over the course of 10 turns, need to raise $120 combined. They each have $40, and each round they can donate $0, $2, or $4. If you don't raise $120, you have a 90% chance of losing all your money due to massive climate change, and a 10% chance of keeping all your money. The goal is, obviously, to keep as much of that $40 as possible.
It's not that hard: convince everybody to put in $2 each round, it adds up to $120 in ten rounds. Done. Except, you never know if the other players are actually donating what they say they are. All you know is how much money is raise in total each round, and how much further you have to go.
Now these donations of money represent various different things, depending on how you view the game. If each player is an individual, then $2 might mean keeping the heat low and wearing a sweater all winter, or it could mean spending the money to put solar panels on your house. $4 could represent never driving a car to work or becoming vegetarian.
When I mentioned this to Mercutio, it became obvious that he has a very simplistic view of this: the government needs to mandate that all of these things happen, and spending the money on making this happen is just a short-term investment which will turn into profit in just 2-8 years. He thinks all congressmen and -women should just raise taxes and spend on deficit, and doesn't understand how anyone could be so short-sighted as to vote such a politician out of office.
Now let's view the game in the light that each player is a nation. We know how Merc would play: he would spend all $4 every round until the job got done, and be broke at the end of the game, probably in debt. Knowing that Merc is playing, other players, like the United States or China, would know that they don't have to donate as much, and might not spend any money on this, restricting themselves to $2 or even $0 most rounds, thinking that maybe some other sucker nations might follow Merc's example.
And that's what's happening right now, only without someone like Merc at the table. Everyone's looking around for someone else to do it, and saying "Who me?" Nobody's willing to be the one to drive themselves broke in order to make the world a better place. Why should the US take such massive sacrifices if China won't? Why should China if Mexico doesn't have to? Why should Mexico unless the US or the Eurozone subsidizes them? Why bother?
Now for my idea: I want to run this as a fund-raiser. I want to get together a group of people and play this game. All the money donated goes to some charity somewhere. Scale the goal to the ante and the number of people. A game with $20 goes and 5 people goes to $50, and once that $50 is raised, the money goes to charity. Or, if that $50 isn't raised, you roll a d10 and on anything by a 10, ALL the money goes to charity.
The same could be done with a game of blackjack or poker, but that doesn't simulate the current situation as well.
Who's in?
It's not that hard: convince everybody to put in $2 each round, it adds up to $120 in ten rounds. Done. Except, you never know if the other players are actually donating what they say they are. All you know is how much money is raise in total each round, and how much further you have to go.
Now these donations of money represent various different things, depending on how you view the game. If each player is an individual, then $2 might mean keeping the heat low and wearing a sweater all winter, or it could mean spending the money to put solar panels on your house. $4 could represent never driving a car to work or becoming vegetarian.
When I mentioned this to Mercutio, it became obvious that he has a very simplistic view of this: the government needs to mandate that all of these things happen, and spending the money on making this happen is just a short-term investment which will turn into profit in just 2-8 years. He thinks all congressmen and -women should just raise taxes and spend on deficit, and doesn't understand how anyone could be so short-sighted as to vote such a politician out of office.
Now let's view the game in the light that each player is a nation. We know how Merc would play: he would spend all $4 every round until the job got done, and be broke at the end of the game, probably in debt. Knowing that Merc is playing, other players, like the United States or China, would know that they don't have to donate as much, and might not spend any money on this, restricting themselves to $2 or even $0 most rounds, thinking that maybe some other sucker nations might follow Merc's example.
And that's what's happening right now, only without someone like Merc at the table. Everyone's looking around for someone else to do it, and saying "Who me?" Nobody's willing to be the one to drive themselves broke in order to make the world a better place. Why should the US take such massive sacrifices if China won't? Why should China if Mexico doesn't have to? Why should Mexico unless the US or the Eurozone subsidizes them? Why bother?
Now for my idea: I want to run this as a fund-raiser. I want to get together a group of people and play this game. All the money donated goes to some charity somewhere. Scale the goal to the ante and the number of people. A game with $20 goes and 5 people goes to $50, and once that $50 is raised, the money goes to charity. Or, if that $50 isn't raised, you roll a d10 and on anything by a 10, ALL the money goes to charity.
The same could be done with a game of blackjack or poker, but that doesn't simulate the current situation as well.
Who's in?