Strategy-proof assignment on the full preference domain

We consider the problem of efficiently allocating several indivisible objects between agents who are to receive at most one object and whose preferences are private information. We examine this standard “assignment” problem from the perspective of mechanism design giving up the usual assumption of linear preferences and instead using a full preference domain (with indifferences permitted). We characterize two classes of mechanisms: (i) Bi-polar Serially Dictatorial Rules by Essential Single-Valuedness, Pareto Indifference, Strategy-Proofness and Non-Bossiness; and (ii) all selections from Bi-polar Serially Dictatorial Rules by Single-Valuedness, Efficiency, Strategy-Proofness and Weak Non-Bossiness. We compare the outcomes from the (Bi-polar) Serially Dictatorial Rules with the outcomes obtained using a market based approach, namely the “core” of the market. We show that all strongly efficient outcomes in the core can be generated using Serially Dictatorial Rules. Moreover, we argue that Serially Dictatorial Rules have an advantage over the market based approach in that they yield strongly efficient solutions for all preference profiles, making it possible to use randomization to restore equity. When preferences are private information, this type of ex ante equity cannot be implemented using the market based approach.     

A simple random assignment problem with a unique solution

Summary. All agents have the same ordinal ranking over all objects, receiving no object (opting out) may be preferable to some objects, agents differ on which objects are worse than opting out, and the latter information is private. The Probabilistic Serial assignment, improves upon (in the Pareto sense) the Random Priority assignment, that randomly orders the agents and offers them successively the most valuable remaining object. We characterize Probabilistic Serial by efficiency in an ordinal sense, and envy-freeness. We characterize it also by ordinal efficiency, strategyproofness and equal treatment of equals. Received: October 5, 1999; revised version: December 20, 2000     

A glove-market partitioned matrix related to the assignment game

To any assignment market we associate the unique exact assignment game defined on the same set of agents and with a core that is a translation of the core of the initial market. As it happens with the core, the kernel and the nucleolus of an assignment game are proved to be the translation of the kernel and the nucleolus of its related exact assignment game by the vector of minimum core payoffs. Agents on each side of the market are classified by means of an equivalence relation and, when agents on the same class are ordered to be consecutive, the related exact assignment market is defined by a partitioned matrix, each block of the partition being a glove market.     

A solution to the hold-up problem involving gradual investment

We consider a setting in which the buyer's ability to hold up a seller's investment is so severe that there is no investment in equilibrium of the static game typically analyzed. We show that there exists an equilibrium of a related dynamic game generating positive investment. The seller makes a sequence of gradually smaller investments, each repaid by the buyer under the threat of losing further seller investment. As modeled frictions converge to zero, the equilibrium outcome converges to the first best. We draw connections between our work and the growing literature on gradualism in public good contribution games and bargaining games.     

A new solution to the problem of adjudicating conflicting claims

Summary. For the problem of adjudicating conflicting claims, we consider the requirement that each agent should receive at least 1/n his claim truncated at the amount to divide, where n is the number of claimants (Moreno-Ternero and Villar, 2004a). We identify two families of rules satisfying this bound. We then formulate the requirement that for each problem, the awards vector should be obtainable in two equivalent ways, (i) directly or (ii) in two steps, first assigning to each claimant his lower bound and then applying the rule to the appropriately revised problem. We show that there is only one rule satisfying this requirement. We name it the “ rule”, as it is obtained by a recursion. We then undertake a systematic investigation of the properties of the rule.Received: 7 September 2004, Revised: 21 April 2005, JEL Classification Numbers: C79, D63, D74.William Thomson: Correspondence toWe thank Christopher Chambers, Youngsub Chun, Tarík Kara, Çağatay Kayí, Juan Moreno-Ternero, Toyotaka Sakai, and Michel Truchon for their comments. We also thank a referee for useful comments. This paper was presented at Columbia University, CORE, Bilkent University, Sabancí University, Université Laval, and Caltech, and at the Mallorca Review of Economic Design meeting. Thomson acknowledges support from the NSF under grant SES-0214691.     

A Solomonic solution to the problem of assigning a private indivisible good

A benevolent Planner wishes to assign an indivisible private good to n claimants, each valuing the object differently. Individuals have quasi-linear preferences. Therefore, the possibility of transfers is allowed. A second-best efficient mechanism is a strategy-proof and anonymous mechanism that is not Pareto dominated by another strategy-proof and anonymous mechanism. In this context, we identify three conditions that are necessary and, together with Voluntary Participation, sufficient for a mechanism to be second-best efficient. This set includes mechanisms that destroy the good at certain profiles. For domains comprising two individuals we provide an explicit characterization of the family of second-best efficient mechanisms.     

我国商业银行规模经济评价方法研究

现有的关于银行规模经济评价的理论,要么基于参数法,要么专注于非参数法,很少有将二者兼顾考虑的评价方法.本文在充分考虑参数法和非参数法利弊的基础上,针对我国商业银行的特点提出了分类规模经济评价的思想.同时在利用DEA方法获得生产可能性集前沿面的基础上,建立了通过拟合生产函数获得各种规模经济评价指标的方法.