Majority stable production equilibria : a multivariate mean shareholders theorem

In a simple parametric general equilibrium model with S states of nature and K S/2. Finally, through parametric examples, these rates are shown to decrease with the homogeneity of the shareholders' beliefs on the probabilities of the states of nature, and to increase with the shareholders' pessimism.Shareholder's vote; general equilibrium; incomplete markets; super majority

Voting in assemblies of shareholders and incomplete markets

An economy with two dates is considered, on state at the first date and a finite number of states at the last date. Shareholders determine production plans b voting -one share, one vote- and at r-majority stable equilibria, alternative production plans are supported by at most rx100 percent of the shareholders.general equilibrium; incomplete markets; firms; voting

Scheduling with Opting Out: Improving upon Random Priority

In a scheduling problem where agents can opt out, we show that the familiar Random Priority (RP) a rule can be improved upon by another mechanism dubbed Probabilistic Serial (PS). Both mechanisms are nonmanipulable in a strong sense, but the latter is Pareto superior to the former and serves a larger (expected number of agents. The PS equilibrium outcome is easier to compute than the RP outcome; on the other hand RP is easier to implement than PS. We show that the improvement of PS over RP is significant but small: at most a couple of percentage points in the relative welfare gain and the relative difference in quantity served. We conjecture that the latter never exceeds 8.33 %. Both gains vanish when the number of agents is large.

Ideology and existence of 50%-majority equilibria in multidimensional spatial voting models

When aggregating individual preferences through the majority rule in an n-dimensional spatial voting model, the `worst-case' scenario is a social choice configuration where no political equilibrium exists unless a super majority rate as high as 1-1/n is adopted. In this paper we assume that a lower d-dimensional (d smaller than n) linear map spans the possible candidates' platforms. These d `ideological' dimensions imply some linkages between the n political issues. We randomize over these linkages and show that there almost surely exists a 50%-majority equilibria in the above worst-case scenario, when n grows to infinity. Moreover the equilibrium is the mean voter. The speed of convergence (toward 50%) of the super majority rate guaranteeing existence of equilibrium is computed for d=1 and 2.

Commons with Increasing Marginal Costs: Random Priority versus Average Cost

Indivisible units are produced with increasing marginal costs. Under average cost, each user pays average cost. Under random priority, users are randomly ordered (without bias) and successively offered to buy at the true marginal cost. Both average cost (AC) and random priority (RP) inefficiently overproduce. RP tends to overproduce less, but which game collects more surplus depends much on the demand configuration. We show that a key to compare the welfare properties of the two mechanisms is the crowding factor, i.e., the number of potential users over the number of units of output users can afford: The more crowded the commons, the more RP outperforms AC. In the quadratic cost case, beyond the threshold value of 2.4 for the crowding factor, RP strongly outperforms AC; beneath it AC only mildly outperforms RP. Thus the RP mechanism manages crowded commons better than AC.

Underemployment of Resources and Self-fulfilling Beliefs: Non-Walrasian Allocations at Walrasian Prices

In this paper the existence of unemployment is partly explained as being the result of coordination failures. It is shown that as a result of self-fulfilling pessimistic expectations, even at Walrasian prices, a continuum of equilibria results, among which an equilibrium with approximately no trade and a Walrasian equilibrium. These coordination failures also arise at other price systems, but then unemployment is the result of both a wrong price system and coordination failures. Some properties of the set of equilibria are analyzed. Generically, there exists a continuum of non-indifferent equilibrium allocations. Under a condition implied by gross substitutability, there exists a continuum of equilibrium allocations in the neighborhood of a competitive allocation, when prices are Walrasian. For a specialized economy, a dynamic illustration is offered.mathematical economics and econometrics ;

Democracy, the Market, and the Firm:How the Interplay between Trading and Voting Fosters Political Stability and Economic Efficiency

Why are collective choices so stable and easy to make in practice, when in theory it should be totally otherwise? This question has puzzled social scientists since Condorcet in the eighteenth century. A striking illustration of this puzzle is the almost unanimous support of shareholders in publicly traded companies to the motions tabled by directors. Democracy, the Market, and the Firm investigates the behavioural assumptions leading to an alignment of shareholders, even in a context of severe market failures, and provides an analysis of the philosophical and axiomatic underpinnings of these assumptions. In sum, and figuratively, Crès and Tvede argue that the invisible hand of the market and the active hand of democracy can work hand in hand to give rise to a better world. The first part of the book explores the interplay between the voting and trading mechanisms. Two main arguments are proposed: on the one hand, the better the market works, the easier it is for majority voting to achieve political stability; on the other hand, among all market equilibria, those that are politically stable are more likely to be economically efficient. The second part of the book explores the feedback from collective choices to individual preferences