Graduation Year
2019
Date of Submission
12-2018
Document Type
Open Access Senior Thesis
Degree Name
Bachelor of Arts
Department
Economics
Reader 1
Laura Grant
Terms of Use & License Information
Rights Information
© Rory C Fontenot
OCLC Record Number
1089198516
Abstract
College course enrollment operates as a market under supply cap. Because of the limited number of seats available for any given course some students who have a higher demand for a course are unable to enroll. The current registration system at the Claremont Colleges functions as a random draw system with added time costs. The lack of price signalling in the markets leads to a loss in overall welfare of the student body. By running data through simulated demand curves I am able to determine, on average, how much welfare is being lost by a random draw system. The percent of maximum welfare achieved compared to maximum possible ranges from forty-nine to eighty percent and largely depends on the proportion of enrolled students to the sum of enrolled + enroll requests as well as the demand function type. With price signalling, the student body would be able to reach the maximum achievable welfare.
Recommended Citation
Fontenot, Rory, "Welfare Losses from First-Come-First-Serve Course Enrollment: Outcome Estimation and Non-Market Maximization" (2019). CMC Senior Theses. 2057.
https://scholarship.claremont.edu/cmc_theses/2057
