Diversity and Optimality

Lu Hong and Scott E. Page

Research in Economics from Santa Fe Institute

Abstract: In this paper, we construct a general model of diverse problem solvers of limited abilities. We use this model to derive two main results: (1) a collection of diverse, bounded problem solvers can locate optimal solutions to difficult problems and (2) a collection of problem solvers of diverse abilities tends to jointly outperform a collection of high ability problem solvers, where a problem solver's ability equals her expected individual problem.

Submitted to: American Economic Review.

Keywords: Diversity; bounded rationality (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 1998-08
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