Highway Economics Presents: Pareto Optimality
11:57 PM - September 25th, 2005
Given a set of resources and individuals, an allocation is considered Pareto optimal (or Pareto efficient) if there is no way to redistribute the resources to make at least one individual better off without making another individual worse off.
To illustrate this concept, let’s say you’re driving on the highway in the left-most lane. The cars in the other lanes are going slower than you are. There’s a car behind you following very closely—the international way of saying “OMG, go faster.” You could switch lanes to let the person behind you pass, but then you’d be going slower. The car behind you could switch lanes so you would no longer be tailgated, but then that person would be going slower. In this case, there’s no way to make anyone better off without making someone else worse off. Thus, it is Pareto optimal.
But what if the other lanes are going at the same speed that you are? In this case, switching lanes would not make you any worse off while making the driver behind you better off. That is called a Pareto improvement.
Class dismissed.
September 26th, 2005 at 8:11 pm
i’m confuzzled… >_
September 26th, 2005 at 8:11 pm
grrr! its supposed to be a little squinty-eyed face!!! ^^;
September 26th, 2005 at 10:53 pm
If you hit the car in front of you, would it be called the Pareto Crunch?
That could be a cool new finishing move name.
September 27th, 2005 at 2:45 am
I found this SOOO amusing for some reason. I seriously feel like I’m sitting in lecture now. I’m usually the one going “OMG THAT’S SO COOL” while everybody else sleeps.
September 27th, 2005 at 7:41 am
why don’t you just speed up? then both you and the car behind you are going faster…
September 27th, 2005 at 8:22 am
Everyone has their own comfortable speed. Going faster than that makes you worse off.
I should’ve ended this post by saying something like “if you can make a pareto improvement, you should because OMG I hate driving behind slow drivers.” =)
(yes, San Jose has turned me into a monster on the streets)
September 27th, 2005 at 9:38 am
but if everyone has their own comfortable speed then if everyone is driving at the same speed than a lot of ppl are worse off cause they are being forced to drive faster or slower respectively…. unless you are saying that we arbitrarily change all these peoples comfortable speed, but then that’s even worse, cause you’re not restricing the speed at which they drive you are not allowing them to be comfortable at any other speed!
September 27th, 2005 at 10:25 am
…i think my brain just died
September 27th, 2005 at 12:30 pm
We’re assuming everyone else on the highway doesn’t matter to keep the example simpler.
Note: Pareto optimality doesn’t mean it’s the best solution. Giving one person everything and everyone else nothing is a Pareto optimal solution.
The point of this whole exercise is that if the car behind you wants to go faster and the lane to your right is going the same speed you are, you should get the hell out of your lane. =)
I think highways need a graded (as in not constant) speed limit; like higher in the left-most lane, then step down to the right-most lane.
September 28th, 2005 at 12:47 pm
i always think our freeways need a lot more work ever since i started driving to folsom to work daily from davis.
first of all, the easiest solution is, the freeway through sacramento downtown needs 10 lanes on each direction. that would solve everything. (that would also mean during off hours like 12am you could drift the hell you want on the road even on slight turns, which is what everybody wants to do, i know) however that isn’t likely to happen in the near future.
so i think sac needs to implement that “limited entrance carpool lane” just like LA and San Diego freeways have. i never knew such thing existed until i went to LA/SD in June. basically through the busiest parts of the freeway, the entire lane is blocked out by double yellow lines (some parts even have a low wall to divide them make sure no cars can violate the rule). the lane is only “enterable” and “exitable” in certain parts of the road. so for people who need to travel long distance but just happen to have to go through that busy part of the freeway, they can go through quickly. now the difference is we need to make this without the “carpool” part in sacramento. reason 1 being i don’t carpool now, reason 2 being most people who need this lane are people who DON’T work in sacramento, like those living in davis and working in folsom, and so on. and these people don’t carpool. having such lane with the carpool requirement is as good as having a non-existent lane because no one would drive on it. it’d also be nice if the speed limit of this lane is 80mph so that everyone can drive legally at 90 and wouldn’t get caught.
side point:
i think the “comfortable speed” of people change over time. by this i don’t maen over years. i mean over the course of the travel over the freeway. at least this is the case for me. the first 1~5 mins as i enter the freeway (especially when i woke up blurry everyday) my comfortable speed is 60~70. as i start to get into “the mode” my comfortable speed would be 80. i’m sure during long drives (e.g. from SF bay area to LA or something) through those plains of nobody anybody’s comfortable speed would be 100.
September 29th, 2005 at 8:19 pm
Its like Tron! Only less corny and more violent. Yay violence! Then you can make cool catchphrases like, “May the Pareto be with you” or “A Pareto is forever” or “Hasta la Pareto, Baby”.