Preseason Poll Rant: Focal Points and Arcade Ladders

A few years ago, I attended a lecture by former World Bank Chief Economist Kaushik Basu in which he discussed his return to the academy to study game theory (Cornell) after a long tenure working in public policy and international relations. I invite Basu into this week’s column not to merely be the only college football blog you’ll read this season that mentions former World Bank Economists, but to discuss his ideas of “focal points.” In these strategically rational situations, certain elements draw attention for no apparent reasons, and they cause inefficiencies. In his talk, Basu illustrated this concept with a game. The game features two players, stranded in an imaginary park. The park has a stream flowing through, and a single bridge over that stream. In addition to the stream, there is a grove of trees, a gazebo, a swing set, and other general park features. The players need to pick a place to rendezvous, but they can’t communicate: each player must pick a point on a map and go there. Where do they go, every time? The bridge, of course. And why do they go to the bridge? It’s a natural sticking point - travel is constrained there, it’s singular over the water, and it draws attention.

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