[go: up one dir, main page]
More Web Proxy on the site http://driver.im/
IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ucp/jpolec/doi10.1086-664613.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Combinatorial Assignment Problem: Approximate Competitive Equilibrium from Equal Incomes

Author

Listed:
  • Eric Budish
Abstract
This paper proposes a new mechanism for combinatorial assignment--for example, assigning schedules of courses to students--based on an approximation to competitive equilibrium from equal incomes (CEEI) in which incomes are unequal but arbitrarily close together. The main technical result is an existence theorem for approximate CEEI. The mechanism is approximately efficient, satisfies two new criteria of outcome fairness, and is strategyproof in large markets. Its performance is explored on real data, and it is compared to alternatives from theory and practice: all other known mechanisms are either unfair ex post or manipulable even in large markets, and most are both manipulable and unfair.

Suggested Citation

  • Eric Budish, 2011. "The Combinatorial Assignment Problem: Approximate Competitive Equilibrium from Equal Incomes," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 119(6), pages 1061-1103.
  • Handle: RePEc:ucp:jpolec:doi:10.1086/664613
    DOI: 10.1086/664613
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/664613
    Download Restriction: Access to the online full text or PDF requires a subscription.

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1086/664613
    Download Restriction: Access to the online full text or PDF requires a subscription.

    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1086/664613?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. William C. Brainard & Herbert E. Scarf, 2005. "How to Compute Equilibrium Prices in 1891," American Journal of Economics and Sociology, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 64(1), pages 57-83, January.
    2. Paul Milgrom, 2000. "Putting Auction Theory to Work: The Simultaneous Ascending Auction," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 108(2), pages 245-272, April.
    3. Konishi, Hideo & Quint, Thomas & Wako, Jun, 2001. "On the Shapley-Scarf economy: the case of multiple types of indivisible goods," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 35(1), pages 1-15, February.
    4. Philip J Reny & Motty Perry, 2006. "Toward a Strategic Foundation for Rational Expectations Equilibrium," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 74(5), pages 1231-1269, September.
    5. Dierker, Egbert, 1971. "Equilibrium Analysis of Exchange Economies with Indivisible Commodities," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 39(6), pages 997-1008, November.
    6. Svensson, Lars-Gunnar, 1983. "Large Indivisibles: An Analysis with Respect to Price Equilibrium and Fairness," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 51(4), pages 939-954, July.
    7. Bogomolnaia, Anna & Moulin, Herve, 2001. "A New Solution to the Random Assignment Problem," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 100(2), pages 295-328, October.
    8. Roth, Alvin E, 1984. "The Evolution of the Labor Market for Medical Interns and Residents: A Case Study in Game Theory," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 92(6), pages 991-1016, December.
    9. Zhou, Lin, 1990. "On a conjecture by gale about one-sided matching problems," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 52(1), pages 123-135, October.
    10. Louis Kaplow & Steven Shavell, 2001. "Any Non-welfarist Method of Policy Assessment Violates the Pareto Principle," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 109(2), pages 281-286, April.
    11. Elliott Peranson & Alvin E. Roth, 1999. "The Redesign of the Matching Market for American Physicians: Some Engineering Aspects of Economic Design," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 89(4), pages 748-780, September.
    12. Robert L. Graves & Linus Schrage & Jayaram Sankaran, 1993. "An Auction Method for Course Registration," Interfaces, INFORMS, vol. 23(5), pages 81-92, October.
    13. Unknown, 1986. "Letters," Choices: The Magazine of Food, Farm, and Resource Issues, Agricultural and Applied Economics Association, vol. 1(4), pages 1-9.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Scott Duke Kominers & Alexander Teytelboym & Vincent P Crawford, 2017. "An invitation to market design," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited, vol. 33(4), pages 541-571.
    2. Miyagawa, Eiichi, 2001. "House Allocation with Transfers," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 100(2), pages 329-355, October.
    3. Parag A. Pathak & Alex Rees-Jones & Tayfun Sönmez, 2020. "Immigration Lottery Design: Engineered and Coincidental Consequences of H-1B Reforms," NBER Working Papers 26767, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    4. Parag A. Pathak & Tayfun Sönmez & M. Utku Ünver & M. Bumin Yenmez, 2024. "Fair Allocation of Vaccines, Ventilators and Antiviral Treatments: Leaving No Ethical Value Behind in Healthcare Rationing," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 70(6), pages 3999-4036, June.
    5. Roth, Alvin E. & Sonmez, Tayfun & Utku Unver, M., 2005. "Pairwise kidney exchange," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 125(2), pages 151-188, December.
    6. Bettina Klaus & David F. Manlove & Francesca Rossi, 2014. "Matching under Preferences," Cahiers de Recherches Economiques du Département d'économie 14.07, Université de Lausanne, Faculté des HEC, Département d’économie.
    7. Eric Budish & Estelle Cantillon, 2012. "The Multi-unit Assignment Problem: Theory and Evidence from Course Allocation at Harvard," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(5), pages 2237-2271, August.
    8. Min Zhu, 2013. "College Admissions in China : A Mechanism Design Perspective," Working Papers 1327, Groupe d'Analyse et de Théorie Economique Lyon St-Étienne (GATE Lyon St-Étienne), Université de Lyon.
    9. Zhu, Min, 2014. "College admissions in China: A mechanism design perspective," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 30(C), pages 618-631.
    10. Alvin E. Roth, 2009. "What Have We Learned from Market Design?," Innovation Policy and the Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 9(1), pages 79-112.
    11. Slonim, Robert & Wang, Carmen, 2016. "Market Design for Altruistic Supply: Evidence from the Lab," IZA Discussion Papers 9650, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    12. Fuhito Kojima & Parag A. Pathak, 2009. "Incentives and Stability in Large Two-Sided Matching Markets," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(3), pages 608-627, June.
    13. Shengwu Li, 2024. "Designing Simple Mechanisms," Papers 2403.18694, arXiv.org, revised Jul 2024.
    14. Mennle, Timo & Seuken, Sven, 2021. "Partial strategyproofness: Relaxing strategyproofness for the random assignment problem," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 191(C).
    15. Atila Abdulkadiroglu & Tayfun Sönmez, 2003. "School Choice: A Mechanism Design Approach," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 93(3), pages 729-747, June.
    16. Jens Gudmundsson, 2019. "Compromises and Rewards: stable and non-manipulable probabilistic matching," International Journal of Game Theory, Springer;Game Theory Society, vol. 48(2), pages 365-392, June.
    17. Parag A. Pathak & Tayfun Sönmez & M. Utku Ünver & M. Bumin Yenmez, 2020. "Leaving No Ethical Value Behind: Triage Protocol Design for Pandemic Rationing," Boston College Working Papers in Economics 997, Boston College Department of Economics, revised 26 Apr 2020.
    18. Sebastian Montano Correa, 2015. "Compulsory Social Service Matching Market for Physicians in Colombia," Documentos CEDE 12856, Universidad de los Andes, Facultad de Economía, CEDE.
    19. Hashimoto, Tadashi, 2018. "The generalized random priority mechanism with budgets," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 177(C), pages 708-733.
    20. Federico Echenique & Sumit Goel & SangMok Lee, 2022. "Stable allocations in discrete exchange economies," Papers 2202.04706, arXiv.org, revised Feb 2024.

    More about this item

    Lists

    This item is featured on the following reading lists, Wikipedia, or ReplicationWiki pages:
    1. The Combinatorial Assignment Problem: Approximate Competitive Equilibrium from Equal Incomes (JPE 2011) in ReplicationWiki

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ucp:jpolec:doi:10.1086/664613. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Journals Division (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/JPE .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.