Brian Mildern Pd.

4 Murder at the Margin This story of how economic is just how economics is the study of business interactions in everyday life. It is about a Harvard professor, Henry Spearman, who was one of the best of the best in economics. This story takes place on the Spearman's trip to Cinnamon Bay Plantation, which was part of the virgin islands. The New York natives were going to stay at a resort at Cinnamon Bay. Supposed to be just a typical vacation for the elder couple. Henry was ready to go snorkeling and swimming and Pidge, his wife, was ready to go island shopping. Unfortunately one of the first unpleasant surprises of this trip was an unexpected mix up with a fellow colleague from Harvard, Professor Mathew Dyke, who was a celebrated theologian professor. Cinnamon Bay was one of the finest worlds resorts known for seafood cuisine and the great water. While Professor Dyke seemed to be friendly, Professor Spearman was not too fond of the man. Professor Dyke who was a big fan of the "planters punch" wasn't the most pleasant man to deal with. Then after this whole encounter, they learned of another visitor to the islands, former senator and supreme court judge, Foote. He was strongly opposed to minority rights and issues of the like. And Professor Dyke made sure to make clear that he wasn't too fond of Foote because of his policies and theories. The first the couple heard of attacks on the islands was about how on the other islands there were attacks by the natives against the richer whites because they felt oppressed by them. The Spearman's stayed on a sub-resort called Turtle Bay where they stayed near Mrs. Doakes and her cousin Decker. When the Foote's arrived they weren't the most appealing couple being very picky and stuck up. Curtis was very athletic while his wife was more subdue to arts and theater. One of the most troublesome men on the resort was General Decker. Because he was a former general he was very particular about everything including his breakfast had to be perfect down to the wire including the perfect color toast and only fresh to the day milk. He was not well liked by many especially the staff of the hotel. One man, Jay Pruitt, strived for the generals approval for his own confidence boost but just didn't get what he wanted and was instead ridiculed. One of the well known entertainment on the island was the steel band led by Ricky Lemans who we later find out is the leader of a radical group called the Raiders who are natives against the oppressive whites. His steel band played at the hotel three times a week. One of the first friends, Mrs. Doakes who Pidge, Henrys wife, made

friends with. Henry Spearman made sure to always bring economics into the everyday situations he dealt with. After dinner with Mrs. Doakes when the spear mans went home, General Decker was found dead on the bus where the Spearman's had rode home. They later found out that he was poisoned. After a Frisbee meeting between Henry and the Clarks, they became friends closely. The Clarks were a very laid back couple who's kids just went back home so they were on their own little vacation. The man put on the case for the murder of General Decker was Franklin Vincent. It was his first big case, due to that he normally dealt with theft and domestic disputes, so he was eager to solve a huge case for his career to compete with co-workers in the other islands. His first suspect was Vernon Habley who was a waiter at the hotel where General Decker was possibly poisoned. He was also part of the radical Raiders group who were against whites so he fit the description. Next was the leader of the steel band and the band of radicals as well, Ricky Lemans. Vincent went to visit Ricky's mom in the nearby neighborhood to question her as well. Vincent made sure to question everyone at the hotel but didn't find much in the way of any help. Professor Spearman had come up with his own theory about the murder but when he proposed it to the detective the detective partially laughed in his face about his theory. Another suspect was Jay Pruitt who Decker didn't seem to hold a close bond too. A big part of the evidence was the newsletter that Ricky Lemans put out called the Raider where on the back he has a section called TARGET where two of the murderers just happened to be on. A couple days later some newcomers came on the ship including Mr. Fitchburg who was a too himself and very stingy man. One day when Spearman went to go snorkeling off Turtle Bay he saw Mr. Fitchburg who complained about the price of the rental of snorkeling equipment which was weird considering you would eventually get your money back. When Spearman returned he learned that Mr. Fitchburg had disappeared and was presumed dead by drowning. One of Professor Dykes startling ideas is of the New Morality which in a sense called for illegal things on the ground that they are allowed in certain situations. This was a very controversial idea that actually made him close with the black community. That next Saturday became the next big problem of the island. While running out on the trail, Curtis Foote happened to pass by Professor Spearman who was jogging as well. Professor Spearman thought nothing of it until about 20 minutes later he found his dead body in one of the blowpipes. Now the situation was getting serious because the hotel had two murders on its hands. And Wyatt hotel manager didn't want Vincent making a big ruckus and making the hotel lose customers. His next new suspect was Laura Burke who was a possible affair of Foote's and happened to talk about meeting him on the trail where he was killed by a blunt object.

Vincent the detective came to a decision it wasn't all to likely it was her after questioning. Vincent finally decided he had enough evidence to take into arrest Ricky Lemans and Vernon Habley based on that they both were prime suspects. When interrogated separately the both confessed the crime. But Professor Spearman wasn't so sure they did it. He believed the prisoner dilemma caused to two to confess which was an easier way out than both of them not confessing or only one, since they didn't know what the other would do. Spearman finally came up with a genius plan to see if his theory was right. He tricked the Clarks into confessing to him that they in fact did murder General Decker and Professor Spearman was right all along. But he still didn't know what happened to Curtis Foote. His first idea was turned down about it being Professor Dyke and then turned to the mysterious disappearance of Mr. Fitchburg. He took his wife to a nearby small island where he believed Mr. Fitchburg might have planned his murder of Foote. What he didn't expect was for Mr. Fitchburg who turned out to be Doug Clarks brother would be on the island with them. With gun point to their heads the spearman were about to lose their life when they were saved by ants attacking Clark. Now with Clark in custody the Spearman's took him to the station where he quickly confessed and the case was finally solved by the economics teacher from Harvard. This book being chosen for reading in an economics class for a reason was chosen because of the variety of different approaches to economics in the book. Professor Henry Spearman was able to apply economics to almost any situation to help him predict human behavior in a way that others couldn't. It starts off with simple things such as when buying a drink he measures the satisfaction gained by the glass of tea just wasn't good enough until he found out it had a lime in it which gave him more utility. As well as anytime he would buy something he made sure to be known of all the alternatives to see which was would maximize his utility to the highest. Such as buying two pima coladas because he felt they gave the most utility for the price. As well as predicting that Professor Dyke due to the law of Demand would be inclined to purchase more alcohol during the happy hour due to a lower price. This involves that when price goes down quantity demanded goes up. Later on Professor talks to Mrs. Doakes about her maximizing her own satisfaction with the sales of her book. He explains to her that she knows that at 14 $ people will buy but at 16$ for a cookbook no one would purchase it. As well at 12 $ she would not get the money she needed so she subconsciously did economic theory in her head displaying maximizing satisfaction. Right after Professor Spearman makes sure to explain to the ladies why they chose the

band they did. Because they are a profit maximizing company they took into consideration the amount of money for entertainment and this was the best price for it they got. When Pruitt saw that a girl he asked to dance denied him but gladly danced with her husband, Professor Spearman made sure to explain inter dependent utility functions which essentially means that she gets pleasure from her partner getting satisfaction. Henrys own way of explaining love through economics. Professor Spearman also put his economic knowledge to explain to Professor Dyke that maybe the use of alien workers in the virgin islands wasn't to make the natives a poorer group but in fact was a more profitable way for the companies to employ workers and gave the companies a maximized profit of margin. He believes that the aliens came here on there own for personal gain and what other choice do companies take but the cheap migrant workers of the more expensive native workers. When the spear mans went shopping in amalie, Henry explained the idea of arbitrage which is making a profit off of cheaper items on the island versus back home. He explained the government limits how much you can take back just for these reason of now taxes on the islands which make the product so cheap. Henry even goes into sateris paribus when he talks about how he would have taken the hiking trail if all else had been equal but because of a time limit not everything was equal. He called the shopping on the dock to be a very centrally planned organization. As the fisherman hawked and bargained prices to maximize as much profit as possible. This is when things got interesting when he starts using his economic theory to solve the murder mystery. He first starts by explaining the situation of how the two men confessed and why. He explains the prisoner dilemma where if a prisoner confesses before his parter or with his partner the damage is a lot less if he pleads innocent and found guilty. This led him to believe they didn't actually do it. Instead he believed it was the Clarks because he explains why he knew the Mr. Fitzhugh was a suspect because while being so stingy why did he care about the payment of the fins if he was going to get his money back when he returned them or maybe he wasn't and as well why did he leave his suntan lotion open this was also part of how he concluded the the Clarks must have killed General Decker because of the law of demand. Why when they sent their kids home on the night of the first murder would they choose to go to a more expensive nightclub when the price of the other clubs went down this was outsider natural human behavior and was first how he explained his belief that they did it. All of his economic theories end up resulting in solving the murder mystery using nothing but knowledge of economics.