The role of normative analysis in markets with hidden knowledge and hidden actions

Keith J. Crocker ()
Additional contact information
Keith J. Crocker: The Pennsylvania State University

The Geneva Risk and Insurance Review, 2024, vol. 49, issue 2, No 1, 163-180

Abstract: Abstract When examining the economic impact of a change in policy regime, one may elect to conduct a positive analysis that considers the effect of such a policy change on the allocations supported as a market equilibrium. An alternative approach would be to perform a normative analysis that examines the effect of the regime change on the set of Pareto optimal allocations in the economy. In settings where the Fundamental Welfare Theorems hold, the isomorphism between equilibrium and Pareto efficient allocations implies that the choice of approach is largely a matter of convenience. When this isomorphism fails to hold, as in settings with hidden information or hidden actions, the equilibrium allocations may not be efficient so that a normative analysis of the alternative efficiency frontiers is required to determine whether the policy change is desirable in the sense of permitting potential Pareto improvements. If so, then an equilibrium analysis may be used to determine the extent to which such improvements may be realized by market participants.

Keywords: Hidden knowledge; Hidden information; Pareto optimality; Equilibrium (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2024
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
http://link.springer.com/10.1057/s10713-024-00101-z Abstract (text/html)
Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:pal:genrir:v:49:y:2024:i:2:d:10.1057_s10713-024-00101-z

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
http://www.springer.com/journal/10713

DOI: 10.1057/s10713-024-00101-z

Access Statistics for this article

The Geneva Risk and Insurance Review is currently edited by Michael Hoy and Nicolas Treich

More articles in The Geneva Risk and Insurance Review from Palgrave Macmillan, International Association for the Study of Insurance Economics (The Geneva Association) Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().