1. Living with roommates, there should be a clear understanding of property rights in the common areas. If my roommate put personal food they purchased with their own money in the refrigerator, I would be excluded from consuming it. That would be the roommate's private good or property, but if we have a budget for groceries and we share everything in the fridge, the goods are non-excludable. Access to the refrigerator is not restricted so technically, anybody can access it and eat what they please unless everyone is on the same page about property rights. Accessing the refrigerator easily can cause problems because someone can consume something they did not pay for in economics this is called free riders.

2. if I put my food in a fridge that my roommates and I share, it would disappear before I get a chance to eat it myself. Using the concept of "free riders" that we learned in this module, public services can often get taken advantage of due to their open and free accessibility to the public. This is why governments pose indirect taxes on citizens concerning these amenities. Applying the concept of "free riders" to this scenario, because my roommates and I share the fridge, and therefore they have free and complete access to it, I feel like they would undoubtedly eat the food I put. The only way to combat this would be to mimic what the government does in some way. The roommates and I could set a boundary that anyone who eats food that isn't their own has to pay a fee or something along these lines.

Do you agree with the prediction about whether their food will likely disappear in both scenarios?

Please help me resolve any issues related to the shared refrigerator space based on these concepts.