On the Optimal Composition of Committees

Ruth Ben-Yashar () and Leif Danziger ()
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Ruth Ben-Yashar: Bar-Ilan University

No 7963, IZA Discussion Papers from Institute of Labor Economics (IZA)

Abstract: This paper derives a simple characterization of how to optimally divide an organization's experts into different decision-making committees. The focus is on many three-member committees that make decisions by a simple majority rule. We find that the allocation of experts to committees is optimal if and only if it minimizes the sum of the products of the experts' skills in each committee. As a result, given the experts of any two committees, the product of the experts' skills should be as similar as possible in the two committees, and it is never optimal to have the three worst experts in one committee and the three best experts in another.

Keywords: optimal composition of committees; simple majority rule (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D71 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 15 pages
Date: 2014-02
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cdm, nep-mic and nep-net
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

Published - published in: Social Choice and Welfare, 2014, 43 (4), 973-980

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Related works:
Journal Article: On the optimal composition of committees (2014)
Working Paper: On the Optimal Composition of Committees (2014)
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