Pigouvian pricing and stochastic evolutionary implementation

pricing;game theory

Boltzmann meets Nash: Energy-efficient routing in optical networks under uncertainty

Motivated by the massive deployment of power-hungry data centers for service provisioning, we examine the problem of routing in optical networks with the aim of minimizing traffic-driven power consumption. To tackle this issue, routing must take into account energy efficiency as well as capacity considerations; moreover, in rapidly-varying network environments, this must be accomplished in a real-time, distributed manner that remains robust in the presence of random disturbances and noise. In view of this, we derive a pricing scheme whose Nash equilibria coincide with the network's socially optimum states, and we propose a distributed learning method based on the Boltzmann distribution of statistical mechanics. Using tools from stochastic calculus, we show that the resulting Boltzmann routing scheme exhibits remarkable convergence properties under uncertainty: specifically, the long-term average of the network's power consumption converges within $\varepsilon$ of its minimum value in time which is at most $\tilde O(1/\varepsilon^2)$, irrespective of the fluctuations' magnitude; additionally, if the network admits a strict, non-mixing optimum state, the algorithm converges to it - again, no matter the noise level. Our analysis is supplemented by extensive numerical simulations which show that Boltzmann routing can lead to a significant decrease in power consumption over basic, shortest-path routing schemes in realistic network conditions.Comment: 24 pages, 4 figure

Negative externalities and evolutionary implementation

game theory;externalities

Decentralized trade, random utility and the evolution of social welfare

We study decentralized trade processes in general exchange economies and house allocation problems with and without money. The processes are subject to persistent random shocks stemming from agents' maximization of random utility. By imposing structure on the utility noise term -logit distribution-, one is able to calculate exactly the stationary distribution of the perturbed Markov process for any level of noise. We show that the stationary distribution places the largest probability on the maximizers of weighted sums of the agents' (intrinsic) utilities, and this probability tends to 1 as noise vanishe

Biodiversity Conservation on Private Lands: Information Problems and Regulatory Choices

This survey paper examines various information insufficiencies in biodiversity conservation and their impact of regulatory choices. We surveyed the literature in the field and identified four major types of informational insufficiencies in making efficient biodiversity conservation decisions: 1) biological uncertainty 2) natural uncertainty 3) individual information, and 4) monitoring problem. The consequences of these four types of information insufficiencies on the choice of regulatory tools are explored. We discuss in this context three types of regulatory tools: land takings, environmental fees/charges, and contracts. The efficiency of each type of regulatory tools is shown dependent on the specific informational constraints that the regulatory faces.Biodiversity conservation, Information, Regulatory tools

Decentralized trade, random utility and the evolution of social welfare.

We study decentralized trade processes in general exchange economies and house allocation problems with and without money. The processes are subject to persistent random shocks stemming from agents' maximization of random utility. By imposing structure on the utility noise term -logit distribution-, one is able to calculate exactly the stationary distribution of the perturbed Markov process for any level of noise. We show that the stationary distribution places the largest probability on the maximizers of weighted sums of the agents' (intrinsic) utilities, and this probability tends to 1 as noise vanishes

DECENTRALIZED TRADE, RANDOM UTILITY AND THE EVOLUTION OF SOCIAL WELFARE

We study decentralized trade processes in general exchange economies and house allocation problems with and without money. The processes are subject to persistent random shocks stemming from agents’ maximization of random utility. By imposing structure on the utility noise term —logit distribution—, one is able to calculate exactly the stationary distribution of the perturbed Markov process for any level of noise. We show that the stationary distribution places the largest probability on the maximizers of weighted sums of the agents’ (intrinsic) utilities, and this probability tends to 1 as noise vanishes

Decentralized Trade, Random Utility and the Evolution of Social Welfare

We study decentralized trade processes in general exchange economies and house allocation problems with and without money. The processes are affected by persistent random shocks stemming from agents' maximization of random utility. By imposing structure on the utility noise term --logit distribution--, one is able to calculate exactly the stationary distribution of the perturbed Markov process for any level of noise. We show that the stationary distribution places the largest probability on the maximizers of weighted sums of the agents' (intrinsic) utilities, and this probability tends to 1 as noise vanishes.decentralized trade, exchange economies, housing markets, long-run stochastic stability, logit model, social welfare functions.

Evolutionary dynamics in heterogeneous populations: a general framework for an arbitrary type distribution

A general framework of evolutionary dynamics under heterogeneous populations is presented. The framework allows continuously many types of heterogeneous agents, heterogeneity both in payoff functions and in revision protocols and the entire joint distribution of strategies and types to influence the payoffs of agents. We clarify regularity conditions for the unique existence of a solution trajectory and for the existence of equilibrium. We confirm that equilibrium stationarity in general and equilibrium stability in potential games are extended from the homogeneous setting to the heterogeneous setting. In particular, a wide class of admissible dynamics share the same set of locally stable equilibria in a potential game through local maximization of the potential

A smart market for passenger road transport (SMPRT) congestion: an application of computational mechanism design

To control and price negative externalities in passenger road transport, we develop an innovative and integrated computational agent based economics (ACE) model to simulate a market oriented "cap" and trade system. (i) First, there is a computational assessment of a digitized road network model of the real world congestion hot spot to determine the "cap" of the system in terms of vehicle volumes at which traffic efficiency deteriorates and the environmental externalities take off exponentially. (ii) Road users submit bids with the market clearing price at the fixed "cap" supply of travel slots in a given time slice (peak hour) being determined by an electronic sealed bid uniform price Dutch auction. (iii) Cross-sectional demand data on car users who traverse the cordon area is used to model and calibrate the heterogeneous bid submission behaviour in order to construct the inverse demand function and demand elasticities. (iv) The willingness to pay approach with heterogeneous value of time is contrasted with the generalized cost approach to pricing congestion with homogeneous value of travel time.