Question 3.110

3.110 Learning about markets.

Your economics professor wonders if playing market games online will help students understand how markets set prices. You suggest an experiment: have some students use the online games, while others discuss markets in recitation sections. The course has two lectures, at 8:30 A.M. and 2:30 P.M. There are 11 recitation sections attached to each lecture. The students are already assigned to recitations. For practical reasons, all students in each recitation must follow the same program.

  1. The professor says, “Let’s just have the 8:30 group do online work in recitation and the 2:30 group do discussion.” Why is this a bad idea?
  2. Outline the design of an experiment with the 22 recitation sections as cases. Carry out your randomization, and include in your outline the recitation numbers assigned to each treatment.