Allocation rules incorporating interval uncertainty

This paper provides several answers to the question “How to cope with rationing problems with interval data?” Interval allocation rules which are efficient and reasonable are designed, with special attention to interval bankruptcy problems with standard claims and allocation rules incorporating the interval uncertainty of the estate.allocation rules, bankruptcy, interval uncertainty

Disputed Lands

In this paper we consider the classical problem of dividing a land among many agents so that everybody is satisfied with the parcel she receives. In the literature, it is usually assumed that all the agents are endowed with cardinally comparable, additive, and monotone utility functions. In many economic and political situations violations of these assumptions may arise. We show how a family of cardinally comparable utility functions can be obtained starting directly from the agents’ preferences, and how a fair division of the land is feasible, without additivity or monotonicity requirements. Moreover, if the land to be divided can be modelled as a finite dimensional simplex, it is possible to obtain envy-free (and a fortiori fair) divisions of it into subsimplexes. The main tool is an extension of a representation theorem of Gilboa and Schmeidler (1989).Gender Fair Division; Envy-freeness; Preference Representation.

Bayesian Posteriors Without Bayes' Theorem

The classical Bayesian posterior arises naturally as the unique solution of several different optimization problems, without the necessity of interpreting data as conditional probabilities and then using Bayes' Theorem. For example, the classical Bayesian posterior is the unique posterior that minimizes the loss of Shannon information in combining the prior and the likelihood distributions. These results, direct corollaries of recent results about conflations of probability distributions, reinforce the use of Bayesian posteriors, and may help partially reconcile some of the differences between classical and Bayesian statistics.Comment: 6 pages, no figure

Fair Division of Goods with Market Values

Inheritances, divorces or liquidations of companies require that a common asset is divided among the entitled parties. Legal methods usually consider the market value of goods, while fair division procedures take into account the parties' preferences expressed as cardinal utilities. We combine the two practices to define two procedures that optimally allocate goods with market values to people with preferences.Comment: 29 pages, 1 figure, 17 table

On Labour Shares in Recent Decades: A Survey

We survey the rich literature studying the behaviour of labor shares in recent decades. To explain their dynamics – the main feature being the decline of European and American shares starting in the 1980s – such literature considers models that use either neoclassical or Leontief-type production functions, with both perfectly competitive markets and monopolistic competition coupled by bargaining between firms and workers. These empirical studies in general have produced results that are scarcely robust. However, they suggest that technical change has a negative and significant impact on the labor share. Evidence for a negative effect of globalization variables is clearly brought out for developing countries, whilst for advanced countries, this effect finds less support. Also, they show that product and labor market regulation issues have mixed effects on the labor share. An alternative to the econometric explanation of labor share is given in the final section.Factor Shares, Functional Income Distribution

Disputed Lands

In this paper we consider the classical problem of dividing a land among many agents so that everybody is satisfied with the parcel she receives. In the literature, it is usually assumed that all the agents are endowed with cardinally comparable, additive, and monotone utility functions. In many economic and political situations violations of these assumptions may arise. We show how a family of cardinally comparable utility functions can be obtained starting directly from the agents’ preferences, and how a fair division of the land is feasible, without additivity or monotonicity requirements. Moreover, if the land to be divided can be modelled as a finite dimensional simplex, it is possible to obtain envy-free (and a fortiori fair) divisions of it into subsimplexes. The main tool is an extension of a representation theorem of Gilboa and Schmeidler (1989).In this paper we consider the classical problem of dividing a land among many agents so that everybody is satisfied with the parcel she receives. In the literature, it is usually assumed that all the agents are endowed with cardinally comparable, additive, and monotone utility functions. In many economic and political situations violations of these assumptions may arise. We show how a family of cardinally comparable utility functions can be obtained starting directly from the agents’ preferences, and how a fair division of the land is feasible, without additivity or monotonicity requirements. Moreover, if the land to be divided can be modelled as a finite dimensional simplex, it is possible to obtain envy-free (and a fortiori fair) divisions of it into subsimplexes. The main tool is an extension of a representation theorem of Gilboa and Schmeidler (1989).Refereed Working Papers / of international relevanc

Bayesian Posteriors Without Bayes' Theorem

The classical Bayesian posterior arises naturally as the unique solution of several different optimization problems, without the necessity of interpreting data as conditional probabilities and then using Bayes' Theorem. For example, the classical Bayesian posterior is the unique posterior that minimizes the loss of Shannon information in combining the prior and the likelihood distributions. These results, direct corollaries of recent results about conflations of probability distributions, reinforce the use of Bayesian posteriors, and may help partially reconcile some of the differences between classical and Bayesian statistics

Orders of Criticality in Voting Games

The authors focus on the problem of investigating the blackmail power of players in simple games, which is the possibility of players of threatening coalitions to cause them loss using arguments that are (apparently) unjustified. To this purpose, the classical notion of the criticality of players has been extended, in order to characterize situations where players may gain more power over the members of a coalition thanks to collusion with other players

Cooperation in Dividing the Cake

This paper defines models of cooperation among players partitioning a completely divisible good (such as a cake or a piece of land). The novelty of our approach lies in the players' ability to form coalitions before the actual division of the good with the aim to maximize the average utility of the coalition. A social welfare function which takes into account coalitions drives the division. In addition, we derive a cooperative game which measures the performance of each coalition. This game is compared with the game in which players start cooperating only after the good has been portioned and has been allocated among the players. We show that a modified version of the game played before the division outperforms the game played after the division.This paper defines models of cooperation among players partitioning a completely divisible good (such as a cake or a piece of land). The novelty of our approach lies in the players' ability to form coalitions before the actual division of the good with the aim to maximize the average utility of the coalition. A social welfare function which takes into account coalitions drives the division. In addition, we derive a cooperative game which measures the performance of each coalition. This game is compared with the game in which players start cooperating only after the good has been portioned and has been allocated among the players. We show that a modified version of the game played before the division outperforms the game played after the division.Refereed Working Papers / of international relevanc