Department of Economics

Tulane University
ECON 7160 - Fall 2023
Assignment #1

1. Suppose the events A and B are disjoint. Under what conditions are
AC and B C also disjoint? Please prove your conclusion.
Solution
If A and B are disjoint, then A ∩ B = ∅. If AC and B C are disjoint
, then AC ∩ B C = ∅. For De Morgan’s Laws, we have (A ∪ B)C = ∅,
and (A ∪ B) = S. Given that the events A and B are disjoint, (then
A ∩ B = ∅), then AC = B C = ∅.

2. Please prove the Boole’ Inequality: For any sequence of events

Ai ∈ B, i = 1, 2, . . .?
∞
! ∞
[ X
P Ai ≤ P(Ai )
i=1 i=1
1
Solution

By mathematical induction, for i = 1 we have:

P(A1 ) ≤ P(A1 ) is true.

We assume i=n holds: !

n
[ n
X
P Ai ≤ P(Ai )
i=1 i=1

Then it follows that n=k+1 holds. We know that P (XS 1 ∪ X2 ) = P (X1 ) +

P (X2 ) − P (X1 ∩ X2 ) ≤ P (X1 ) + P (X2 ). If we define X1 S = ni=1 Ai and X2 =
An+1 , because the associativity property we have n+1 i=1 = X1 +X2 , and
we obtain:
n+1
! n
! n
! !
[ [ [ \
P Ai = P Ai + P(An+1 ) − P Ai An+1
i=1 i=1 i=1

Given that P (( ni=1 Ai ) An+1 ) ≥ 0, we have:

S T

n+1
! n
!
[ [
P Ai ≤ P Ai + P(An+1 )
i=1 i=1

1
Proof based on the course textbook Upper Level Undergraduate Probability with
Actuarial and Financial Applications, chapter 15.
 Therefore, !
n+1
[ n
X n+1
X
P Ai ≤ P(Ai ) + P(An+1 ) = P(Ai )
i=1 i=1 i=1
Q.E.D.

3. Suppose there are k students in a class, where 2 ≤ k ≤ 365. What is

the probability that at least two students have the same birth-
day? Here, by the same birthday, we mean the same day of the same
month, but not necessarily of the same year. Moreover, we make the
following assumptions:

(a) No twins in the class;

(b) Each of the 365 days are equally likely to be the birthday of
anyone in the class;
(c) Anyone born on February 29 will be considered as on March 1.

What are the probabilities when k = 20, 30, 40 and 50?

Solution
Let be Ak , the event that at least two people have the same birthday
in a group of k persons. Subsequently, AC k is the event that they
don’t have a common birthday. If there are k students in a class,
then there are 365k possible outcomes, and AC can ocurr in 365 · 364 ·
. . . · (365 − k − 1) different ways. Therefore, the probability of AC
is,
365 · 364 · . . . · (365 − k − 1)
P(ACk ) =
365k
And the probability of A is,
365 · 364 · . . . · (365 − k − 1) 365!
P(Ak ) = 1 − =
365 k 365 (365 − k)
k

The probability for k = 20, 30, 40 and 50 are,

P (A20 ) = 0.411
P (A30 ) = 0.706
P (A40 ) = 0.891
P (A50 ) = 0.970

4. Out of 5 men and 5 women, we form a committee consisting of four

different people. Assuming that each committee of size four is
equally likely, find the probabilities of the following events:

(a) The committee consists of 2 men and 2 women.

(b) The committee has more women than men.
(c) The committee has at least one men.
(d) Assume that Alice (f) and Bob (m) are among the ten people
being considered. What is the probability that both Alice and
Bob are members of the committee?

Solution
First, we calculate the total number of committees we can form. In
this case, The committees are made up of four members chosen from
a universe of ten people:
10!
10 C4 = = 210
6!4!
(a) To obtain the probability of the event that consists of a com-
mittee of 2 men and 2 women, we must first calculate the total
number of committees with this form:
5! 5!
5 C2 ×5 C2 = · = 100
3!2! 3!2!
Therefore, the probability is
100
= 0.476
210
(b) For this case, we calculate probabilities associated with
committees comprising only women or one man.
Only women:
5!
5 C4 ×5 C0 = ·1=5
1!4!
One man:
5!
5 C3 ×5 C1 = · 5 = 50
2!3!
Therefore, the probability is
55
= 0.262
210
(c) The total number of committees with at least one man is

5 C3 ×5 C1 +5 C2 ×5 C2 +5 C1 ×5 C3 +5 C0 ×5 C4
5! 5! 5! 5! 5!
·5+ · +5· + ·1
2!3! 3!2! 3!2! 2!3! 1!4!
50 + 100 + 50 + 5 = 205
 Therefore, the probability is
205
= 0.976
210
(d) For this part, we have to calculate the number of committees
with Alice and Bob
8!
8 C2 = = 28
6!2!
Therefore, the probability is
28
= 0.133
210

5. Each one of n persons, indexed by 1, 2, . . . , n, has a clean hat and

throws it into a box. The persons then pick hats from the box, at
random. Every assignment of the hats to the persons is equally
likely. In an equivalent model, each person picks a hat, one at a
time, in the order of their indices, with each one of the remaining
hats being equally likely to be picked. Find the probability of
the following events:

(a) Every person gets his or her own hat back.

(b) Each one of persons 1, . . . , m gets his or her own hat back, where
1 ≤ m ≤ n.
(c) Each one of persons 1, . . . , m gets back a hat belonging to one of
the last m persons (i.e., persons ≤ n − m + 1, n − m + 2, . . . , n) ≤,
where 1 ≤ m ≤ n.
(d) Now assume, in addition, that every hat thrown into the box has
probability p of getting dirty (independently of what happens
to the other hats or who has dropped or picked it up). Find the
probability that:
i. Persons 1, . . . , m will pick up clean hats.
ii. Exactly m persons will pick up clean hats.

Solution2
(a) The first person can choose between n hats, the second be-
tween n-1 hats, . . . , and the last person can choose only one hat.
Therefore, this sample space has n! items. Given that every as-
signment of the hats to the persons is equally likely, then the
probability of a person get his or her own hat back is 1/n!.
2
This answer is based on Problem Set 3 of the Probabilistic Systems Analysis course
at MIT’s Department of Electrical Engineering & Computer Science.
 (b) Given the first m persons get his or her own hat back, then
there are m−n hats to distribute to the rest of the people. There-
fore, there are (m − n)! elements in this event and the probability
is (m − n)!/n!.
(c) We have to distribute m hats in m persons and n - m hats in n-m
persons. Therefore, the number of elements of this event is m!(n
- m)!, and its probability is m!(n − m)!/n!.
(d) If the probability of choosing a dirty hat is p, then the prob-
ability of selecting a clean one is 1 − p. Therefore, the probabil-
ity that the first m persons will pick up clean hats is (1 − p)m .
(e) If m persons will pick up clean hats and then n − m persons
will pick up dirty hats, then the probability associated with this
single event is (1−p)m ·pn−m . Since
the number of times we can choose
n
m people from a group of n is m , the probability of this event is
n

m
m
(1 − p) · pn−m .

6. Suppose B1 , B2 and B3 are mutually exclusive. If P (B1 ) = P (B2 ) =

P (B3 ) = 1/3 and P (A|Bi ) = i/6 for i = 1, 2, 3, what is P (A)?
Solution
We know that
P (B1 ) = P (B2 ) = P (B3 ) = 1/3
P (A|B1 ) = 1/6
P (A|B2 ) = 2/6 = 1/3
P (A|B3 ) = 3/6 = 1/2

P(A ∩ B1 ) 1
P(A|B1 ) = ⇒ P(A ∩ B1 ) = P(A|B1 ) · P(B1 ) =
P(B1 ) 18

P(A ∩ B2 ) 1
P(A|B2 ) = ⇒ P(A ∩ B2 ) = P(A|B2 ) · P(B2 ) =
P(B2 ) 9
P(A ∩ B3 ) 1
P(A|B3 ) = ⇒ P(A ∩ B3 ) = P(A|B3 ) · P(B3 ) =
P(B3 ) 6
Therefore,
1
P(A) = P(A|B1 ) + P(A|B2 ) + P(A|B3 ) =
3
7. Before leaving for work, Mary checks the weather report in order
to decide whether to carry an umbrella. On any given day, with
probability 0.2 the forecast is ”rain” and with 0.8 the forecast
 is ”no rain”. If the forecast is ”rain”, the probability of ac-
tually having rain on that day is 0.8. On the other hand, if the
forecast is ”no rain”, the probability of actually raining is 0.1.
[Hint: Drawing a tree diagram to display all these scenarios with
their probabilities will be quite useful to answer these ques-
tions.]

(a) One day, Mary missed the forecast and it rained. What is the
probability that the forecast was ”rain”?
(b) Mary misses the morning forecast with probability 0.2 on any
day in the year. If she misses the forecast, Mary will flip
a fair coin to decide whether to carry an umbrella. We assume
that the result of the coin flip is independent of the forecast
and the weather. On any day she sees the forecast, if it says
”rain” she will always carry an umbrella, and if it says ”no
rain” she will not carry an umbrella. Let U be the even that
”Mary is carrying an umbrella”, and let N be the event that the
forecast is ”no rain”. Are events U and N independent? Why?
(c) Mary is carrying an umbrella and it is not raining. What is
the probability that she saw the forecast? [Hint: You should
calculate the probabilities of ”actually rains” and ”actually
no rain” first.]
Solution
At the end of the document.

8. Prove each of the following statements. (Assume that any condi-

tioning event has positive probability)

(a) If P (B) = 1, then P (A|B) = P (A) for any A.

(b) If A ⊂ B, then P (B|A) = 1 and P (A|B) = P (A)/P (B).
(c) If A and B are disjoint, then P (A|A ∪ B) = P (A)/(P (A) + P (B))

Solution
(a)
P (A ∩ B)
P (A|B) =
P (B)
= P (A ∩ B), because P (B) = 1
Using Theorem 1.29 from Casella & Berger, we have:

P(A) = P(A ∩ B) + P(A ∩ BC )

Then,

P (A|B) = P (A) − P (A ∩ B C )
= P (A), given that P (A ∩ B C ) = 0, because B C = ∅

(b) Given that A ⊂ B, then P (A ∩ B) = P (A) and P (A ∩ B C ) = 0

P (B ∩ A)
P (B|A) =
P (A)
P (A)
=
P (A)
=1
P (A ∩ B)
P (A|B) =
P (B)
P (A) − P (A ∩ B C )
=
P (B)
P (A)
=
P (B)
(c)
P[A ∩ (A ∪ B)]
P[A|(A ∪ B)] =
P(A ∪ B)
On the one hand, we have:

A ∩ (A ∪ B) = (A ∪ A) ∪ (A ∩ B)
= A, given that (A ∪ A) = A and (A ∩ B) = ∅.

On the other hand, we have:

P (A ∪ B) = P (A) + P (B) − P (A ∩ B)
= P (A) + P (B), given that P (A ∩ B) = 0 porque (A ∩ B) = ∅.

Using both results:

P [A ∩ (A ∪ B)]
P [A|(A ∪ B)] =
P (A ∪ B)
P (A)
=
P (A) + P (B)
Answer to Question 7