Egalitarian random assignment

Conal Duddy ()
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Conal Duddy: Cork University Business School, University College Cork

Economic Theory, 2025, vol. 80, issue 1, No 8, 354 pages

Abstract: Abstract I argue that envy-freeness can obstruct fairness in the random assignment problem and I propose a new fairness criterion called even-handedness. Loosely speaking, a random assignment that maximises the position of the least advantaged agent is even-handed. Rules of random assignment that are stochastic-dominance efficient cannot be both even-handed and envy-free for groups of four or more. I define new rules called positive equality, prudent equality and balanced equality that are even-handed and stochastic-dominance efficient. The positive equality rule is envy-free for groups of three and average-envy-free for groups of any size. I present a general method of extending rules from the domain of strict preference to that of weak preference. That method is applicable to the equality rules, the serial rule and others. I also define a network flow algorithm for the positive equality rule.

Keywords: Assignment; Envy; Egalitarian; Maximin; Serial; D61; D63; D71 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2025
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DOI: 10.1007/s00199-024-01632-2

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