Optimal Priority-Based Allocation Mechanisms

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peng Shi
Keyword(s):  
Elementary School ◽  
School Choice ◽  
Revenue Management ◽  
Choice Behavior ◽  
Planning Problem ◽  
Market Models ◽  
Special Cases ◽  
Choice Sets ◽  
Deferred Acceptance ◽  
Student Welfare

This paper develops a tractable methodology for designing an optimal priority system for assigning agents to heterogeneous items while accounting for agents’ choice behavior. The space of mechanisms being optimized includes deferred acceptance and top trading cycles as special cases. In contrast to previous literature, I treat the inputs to these mechanisms, namely the priority distribution of agents and quotas of items, as parameters to be optimized. The methodology is based on analyzing large market models of one-sided matching using techniques from revenue management and solving a certain assortment planning problem whose objective is social welfare. I apply the methodology to school choice and show that restricting choices may be beneficial to student welfare. Moreover, I compute optimized choice sets and priorities for elementary school choice in Boston. This paper was accepted by Gabriel Weintraub, revenue management and market analytics.

scholarly journals Heterogeneous Beliefs and School Choice Mechanisms

2020 ◽  
Vol 110 (5) ◽  
pp. 1274-1315 ◽  
Author(s):  
Adam J. Kapor ◽  
Christopher A. Neilson ◽  
Seth D. Zimmerman
Keyword(s):  
School Choice ◽  
Rational Expectations ◽  
Choice Behavior ◽  
Heterogeneous Beliefs ◽  
Welfare Costs ◽  
Subjective Beliefs ◽  
Opposite Conclusion ◽  
Deferred Acceptance Algorithm ◽  
Deferred Acceptance ◽  
Strategy Proof

This paper studies how welfare outcomes in centralized school choice depend on the assignment mechanism when participants are not fully informed. Using a survey of school choice participants in a strategic setting, we show that beliefs about admissions chances differ from rational expectations values and predict choice behavior. To quantify the welfare costs of belief errors, we estimate a model of school choice that incorporates subjective beliefs. We evaluate the equilibrium effects of switching to a strategy-proof deferred acceptance algorithm, and of improving households’ belief accuracy. We find that a switch to truthful reporting in the DA mechanism offers welfare improvements over the baseline given the belief errors we observe in the data, but that an analyst who assumed families had accurate beliefs would have reached the opposite conclusion. (JEL D83, H75, I21, I28)

scholarly journals Beyond Truth-Telling: Preference Estimation with Centralized School Choice and College Admissions

2019 ◽  
Vol 109 (4) ◽  
pp. 1486-1529 ◽  
Author(s):  
Gabrielle Fack ◽  
Julien Grenet ◽  
Yinghua He
Keyword(s):  
School Choice ◽  
Test Scores ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Truth Telling ◽  
Student Preferences ◽  
Ex Post ◽  
Is Strategy ◽  
Deferred Acceptance ◽  
Strategy Proof ◽  
Novel Approaches

We propose novel approaches to estimating student preferences with data from matching mechanisms, especially the Gale-Shapley deferred acceptance. Even if the mechanism is strategy-proof, assuming that students truthfully rank schools in applications may be restrictive. We show that when students are ranked strictly by some ex ante known priority index (e.g., test scores), stability is a plausible and weaker assumption, implying that every student is matched with her favorite school/college among those she qualifies for ex post. The methods are illustrated in simulations and applied to school choice in Paris. We discuss when each approach is more appropriate in real-life settings. (JEL D11, D12, D82, I23)

What Do Parents Want From Schools? Evidence From the Internet

2002 ◽  
Vol 24 (2) ◽  
pp. 133-144 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mark Schneider ◽  
Jack Buckley
Keyword(s):  
School Choice ◽  
Information Search ◽  
Choice Behavior ◽  
The United States ◽  
Parental Choice ◽  
Reduced Pressure ◽  
Telephone Interviews ◽  
United States Today ◽  
Parental Preferences ◽  
Search Patterns

One of the most contentious policy areas in the United States today is the expansion of school choice. While many dimensions of parental-choice behavior have been analyzed, many of the most enduring questions center on the aspects of schools parents prefer and how these preferences will affect the socioeconomic and racial composition of schools. Using Internet-based methodological tools, we study parental preferences revealed through information search patterns and compare these findings to the standard ones in the literature, which are based largely on telephone interviews. Based on this evidence we suggest that unfettered choice may lead to undesirable outcomes in the distribution of students, and it may also lead to reduced pressure on schools to improve academic performance.

Age Differences in Children's Choice Behavior: The Impact of Available Alternatives

1992 ◽  
Vol 29 (2) ◽  
pp. 216-226 ◽  
Author(s):  
Deborah Roedder John ◽  
Ramnath Lakshmi-Ratan
Keyword(s):  
Age Differences ◽  
Choice Behavior ◽  
Older Children ◽  
Choice Process ◽  
Allocation Procedure ◽  
Choice Sets ◽  
Different Ages ◽  
Similarity Judgments ◽  
The Impact ◽  
Choice Set

The authors examine how children of different ages respond to the addition of new alternatives into an existing choice set. Children 4 to 12 years of age made choices from an initial and an expanded set of products using a modified constant sum allocation procedure. The findings indicate that younger children respond differently than older children to the expansion of choice sets and that this pattern is related, in part, to age differences in children's ability to incorporate similarity judgments into the choice process.

Dynamic Random Utility

Econometrica ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 87 (6) ◽  
pp. 1941-2002 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mira Frick ◽  
Ryota Iijima ◽  
Tomasz Strzalecki
Keyword(s):  
Choice Behavior ◽  
Empirical Work ◽  
Parameter Estimates ◽  
Random Utility ◽  
Choice Data ◽  
Stochastic Choice ◽  
Axiomatic Analysis ◽  
Special Cases ◽  
Dynamic Stochastic ◽  
Bayesian Rationality

We provide an axiomatic analysis of dynamic random utility, characterizing the stochastic choice behavior of agents who solve dynamic decision problems by maximizing some stochastic process ( U t ) of utilities. We show first that even when ( U t ) is arbitrary, dynamic random utility imposes new testable across‐period restrictions on behavior, over and above period‐by‐period analogs of the static random utility axioms. An important feature of dynamic random utility is that behavior may appear history‐dependent, because period‐ t choices reveal information about U t , which may be serially correlated; however, our key new axioms highlight that the model entails specific limits on the form of history dependence that can arise. Second, we show that imposing natural Bayesian rationality axioms restricts the form of randomness that ( U t ) can display. By contrast, a specification of utility shocks that is widely used in empirical work violates these restrictions, leading to behavior that may display a negative option value and can produce biased parameter estimates. Finally, dynamic stochastic choice data allow us to characterize important special cases of random utility—in particular, learning and taste persistence—that on static domains are indistinguishable from the general model.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document