Altruistically unbalanced kidney exchange

Tayfun Sönmez and Utku Unver

Journal of Economic Theory, 2014, vol. 152, issue C, 105-129

Abstract: Although a pilot national live-donor kidney exchange program was recently launched in the US, the kidney shortage is increasing faster than ever. A new solution paradigm is able to incorporate compatible pairs in exchange. In this paper, we consider an exchange framework that has both compatible and incompatible pairs, and patients are indifferent over compatible pairs. Only two-way exchanges are permitted because of institutional constraints. We explore the structure of Pareto-efficient matchings in this framework. We show that under Pareto-efficient matchings, the same number of patients receive transplants, and it is possible to construct Pareto-efficient matchings that match the same incompatible pairs while matching the least number of compatible pairs. We extend the celebrated Gallai–Edmonds Decomposition in the combinatorial optimization literature to our new framework. We also conduct comparative static exercises on how this decomposition changes as new compatible pairs join the pool.

Keywords: Kidney exchange; Market design; Matching (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C78 D02 D63 D78 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2014
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (21)

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Working Paper: Altruistically Unbalanced Kidney Exchange (2013)
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jetheo:v:152:y:2014:i:c:p:105-129

DOI: 10.1016/j.jet.2014.04.003

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