A Question of Candy

Imagine that you are a student in Ms. Applegate’s first grade classroom, along with 29 other kids. And Ms. Applegate tells you it’s the tradition at Adams Elementary for all the kids to bring in their Halloween treats to show off to the other kids on the first Monday after trick-or-treat. Because it turns out THERE’S A CONTEST between Ms. Applegate’s class and Mr. Bucktooth’s class, and whichever class collects the most candy WINS!

So the day after Halloween all the kids bring their candy to school. Fat Howie has 265 candies, and you know for a fact that he didn’t even go out trick-or-treating because he’s a lardass who spends all day watching TV. However, his father owns a candy store. And the Baker twins collected 320 pieces between them by working hard and double shifting. And so on down the line, everyone with more or less candy depending on how hard they worked, where they lived, and who their father is.

At the very bottom of the list are three kids with zero pieces of candy on their desks. When Ms. Applegate asks them why they didn’t bring any candy, one kid says he forgot, another says he had to work in his father’s tienda that night, and another kid says he don’t need no stinking Halloween. 

To remedy this inequity, Ms. Applegate says she has a Wonderful Idea! We’re going to put all the candy in one big pile, and then we’re going to Divide It Up Equally! Everyone in favor of that great idea raise their hands!  And almost every kid in the classroom raises their hand, including you, even though you calculate that you’ll leave the class with fewer candies than you came with. But it’s all worth it because IT’S FAIR!

Now here’s the question: next year, will Ms. Applegate’s 2^ndgraders bring in more candy or less candy than they did this year? Is there any way to know for sure? Does human nature make any difference in carrying out Wonderful Ideas?

Discuss.