A proof-theoretical view of collective rationality

The impossibility results in judgement aggregation show a clash between fair aggregation procedures and rational collective outcomes. In this paper, we are interested in analysing the notion of rational outcome by proposing a proof-theoretical understanding of collective rationality. In particular, we use the analysis of proofs and inferences provided by linear logic in order to define a fine-grained notion of group reasoning that allows for studying collective rationality with respect to a number of logics. We analyse the well-known paradoxes in judgement aggregation and we pinpoint the reasoning steps that trigger the inconsistencies. Moreover, we extend the map of possibility and impossibility results in judgement aggregation by discussing the case of substructural logics. In particular, we show that there exist fragments of linear logic for which general possibility results can be obtained

Negotiating Socially Optimal Allocations of Resources

A multiagent system may be thought of as an artificial society of autonomous software agents and we can apply concepts borrowed from welfare economics and social choice theory to assess the social welfare of such an agent society. In this paper, we study an abstract negotiation framework where agents can agree on multilateral deals to exchange bundles of indivisible resources. We then analyse how these deals affect social welfare for different instances of the basic framework and different interpretations of the concept of social welfare itself. In particular, we show how certain classes of deals are both sufficient and necessary to guarantee that a socially optimal allocation of resources will be reached eventually

Viable tax constitutions

Taxation is only sustainable if the general public complies with it. This observation is uncontroversial with tax practitioners but has been ignored by the public finance tradition, which has interpreted tax constitutions as binding contracts by which the power to tax is irretrievably conferred by individuals to government, which can then levy any tax it chooses. However, in the absence of an outside party enforcing contracts between members of a group, no arrangement within groups can be considered to be a binding contract, and therefore the power of tax must be sanctioned by individuals on an ongoing basis. In this paper we offer, for the first time, a theoretical analysis of this fundamental compliance problem associated with taxation, obtaining predictions that in some cases point to a re-interptretation of the theoretical constructions of the public finance tradition while in others call them into question

Collective Female Labor Supply: Theory and Application

In this paper, we deal with female labour supply in the collective framework (Chiappori, Journal of Political Economy (1992)). We study married couples and start from the empirical observation that the husband's labour supply is generally determined by exogenous constraints. We then show that, in this case, structural elements of the decision process, such as individual preferences or the rule that determines the intra-household distribution of welfare, can be identified if household demand for at least one commodity, together with the wife's labour supply, is observed. These theoretical considerations are followed by an empirical application using French data. Dans cet article, nous traitons la question de l'offre féminine de travail dans le cadre de l'approche collective (Chiappori, Journal of Political Economy (1992)). Nous étudions des couples mariés et partons de l'observation empirique que l'offre de travail du mari est généralement déterminée par des contraintes exogènes. Nous montrons alors que, dans ce cas, des éléments structurels du processus de décision, tels que les préférences individuelles or la règle qui détermine la répartition intra-familiale du bien-être peut-être identifiée à condition que la demande pour au moins un bien est observée conjointement avec l'offre de travail. Ces considérations théoriques sont suivies par une application empirique utilisant des données françaises.Collective Decisions, Female labour Supply, Commodity Demands, Intra-household Distribution

Logics for modelling collective attitudes

We introduce a number of logics to reason about collective propositional attitudes that are defined by means of the majority rule. It is well known that majoritarian aggregation is subject to irrationality, as the results in social choice theory and judgment aggregation show. The proposed logics for modelling collective attitudes are based on a substructural propositional logic that allows for circumventing inconsistent outcomes. Individual and collective propositional attitudes, such as beliefs, desires, obligations, are then modelled by means of minimal modalities to ensure a number of basic principles. In this way, a viable consistent modelling of collective attitudes is obtained

Opening the Black Box of Intra-Household Decision-Making: Theory and Non-Parametric Empirical Tests of General Collective Consumption Models

We non-parametrically test a general collective consumption model with public consumption and externalities inside the household.We further propose a novel approach to model special cases of the general collective model.These special cases include alternative restrictions on the 'sharing rule' that applies to each household, and which defines the distribution of the household budget over the household members.A limiting case is the unitary model.Our application uses data from the Russia Longitudinal Monitoring Survey (RLMS); the panel structure of this data set allows non-parametric testing of the behavioral models without relying on preference homogeneity assumptions across similar individuals.This application includes test results but also a power analysis for different specifications of the collective consumption model.Our main findings are that the most general collective model, together with a large class of special but still fairly general cases, cannot be rejected by the data, while other restricted versions of the general model, including the unitary alternative, are rejected.Since these tests are entirely non-parametric, this provides strong evidence in favor of models focusing on intra-household decisionmaking.collective household models;intra-household allocation;revealed pref- erences;non-parametric analysis

Opening the black box of intra-household decision-making: Theory and non-parametric empirical tests of general collective consumption models.

We non-parametrically test a general collective consumption model with public consumption and externalities inside the household. We further propose a novel approach to model special cases of the general collective model. These special cases include alternative restrictions on the `sharing rule' that applies to each household, and which defines the distribution of the household budget over the household members. A limiting case is the unitary model. Our application uses data from the Russia Longitudinal Monitoring Survey (RLMS); the panel structure of this data set allows non-parametric testing of the behavioral models without relying on preference homogeneity assumptions across similar individuals. This application includes test results but also a power analysis for different specifications of the collective consumption model. Our main findings are that the most general collective model, together with a large class of special but still fairly general cases, cannot be rejected by the data, while other, restricted, versions of the general model, including the unitary alternative, are rejected. Since these tests are entirely non-parametric, this provides strong evidence in favor of models focusing on intra-household decision-making.Consumption; Decision making; Model; Models; Tests; Theory;