Can not wanting to wear a mask be rational?

Amitrajeet Batabyal

Economics Bulletin, 2022, vol. 42, issue 3, 1399 - 1404

Abstract: I answer the question in the title by analyzing an office environment in which n?N individuals work together in an enclosed area. The ith worker wears his mask for h_i hours per day and this action involves a disutility. His health benefit from wearing a mask depends on how his mask wearing compares with the mask wearing of his co-workers. In this setting, I first compute the symmetric Nash equilibrium that describes the optimal number of hours of mask wearing by each worker. Second, I compute the Pareto efficient level of mask wearing on the part of the n workers. Finally, I explain why there is excessive mask wearing in the Nash equilibrium and then point out that it can indeed be rational to not want to wear a mask.

Keywords: Mask; Nash Equilibrium; Pareto Efficiency; Rat Race (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C7 I1 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2022-09-30
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Working Paper: Can Not Wanting to Wear a Mask be Rational? (2022)
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