MathDB

In an election for the Peer Pressure High School student council president, there are 2019 voters and two candidates Alice and Celia (who are voters themselves). At the beginning, Alice and Celia both vote for themselves, and Alice's boyfriend Bob votes for Alice as well. Then one by one, each of the remaining 2016 voters votes for a candidate randomly, with probabilities proportional to the current number of the respective candidate's votes. For example, the first undecided voter David has a

\tfrac{2}{3}

probability of voting for Alice and a

\tfrac{1}{3}

probability of voting for Celia.
What is the probability that Alice wins the election (by having more votes than Celia)?

Problem Statement