Packet 2: Tossup 16

Note to moderator: Read answerline carefully. Note to players: Description acceptable. The presumption of a “neuter” person named for this activity is criticized by feminist planning scholars like Robin Low. Reid Ewing and Robert Cervero found that individual factors had little effect on this activity as measured by “VMT” but the “built (10[1])environment” overall did. Jonah Lehrer (10[1])popularized a “paradox” that this activity lowers well-being, since its variability is “Stress That Doesn’t Pay.” Marchetti’s constant (10[1])measures (10[1])this activity. (10[1])The USDA Economic Research Service defines “zones” named for this activity from Census Bureau data (10[1])on its “flows” (10[1])and then aggregates (10[1])those zones into labor market areas. (10[1])A worker that spends more than three hours on this (10[1])activity (10[3])a day (10[1])is said to be (10[2])a “super” (10[2])type (10[2])of person named for it. (10[1])For 10 points, describe this activity that stereotypically starts in a suburb and ends in a business district. ■END■

ANSWER: commuting [or word forms; accept “neuter commuter”; accept descriptions of traveling to work, transit to a job, driving to work, or going to work by any other means; accept travel, transit, driving, or car or vehicle use until “variability” is read and prompt thereafter by asking “for what purpose?”; prompt on walking; prompt on answers that describe going to a city instead of to work; prompt on answers describing being stuck in traffic] (“VMT” is “vehicle miles traveled”; “Stress That Doesn’t Pay” is the phrasing of Alois Stutzer and Bruno Frey, whose study of the “commuting paradox” Lehrer popularized.)
<Northwestern A, Social Science> | B. Prelims 2 - Northwestern A + Virginia Tech + Brown + Penn State
= Average correct buzzpoint

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Buzzes

PlayerTeamOpponentBuzzpointValue
Jacob Hardin-BernhardtNYU BWaterloo5110
John John GrogerWashUGeorgia Tech A5610
Ian ParsonsMaryland BToronto A7410
Adam FineChicago AOhio State7510
Robert WangColumbia AUCF7710
Joseph ChambersVirginiaCambridge9210
Ryan RosenbergNYU AStanford B9510
Vivian MaloufUC Berkeley ARutgers9810
Jakob MyersIndianaMIT10410
Ved MuthusamyNorthwestern BJohns Hopkins11410
John ChenBritish ColumbiaNorth Carolina11510
Kevin PengCornellColumbia B11510
Andrew WangIllinois AVanderbilt11510
Owen SteeleSwarthmoreTexas11710
Todd MaslykMichiganGeorgia Tech C12110
Jiping FangIllinois BToronto B12110
Andrew ZengStanford ABruin12310
Yash TiwariMinnesotaGeorgia Tech B12310
Cole HartungGeorgetownHarvard12410
Mattias EhatammMaryland APittsburgh12410
Evan GniadekPurdueUCLA12910

Summary

TournamentEditionMatchHeardConv. %Neg %Avg. Buzz
Main Site2026-04-17✓21100%0%103.00