Parallel Lotteries: Insights from Alaskan Hunting Permit Allocation

We analyze the parallel lottery that is used to allocate hunting permits in the state of Alaska. Each participant is given tickets to distribute among lotteries for different types of items. Participants who win multiple items receive their favorite, and new winners are drawn from the lotteries with unclaimed items. When supply is scarce, equilibrium outcomes of parallel lotteries approximate a competitive equilibrium from equal incomes (CEEI), which is Pareto efficient. When supply is moderate, parallel lotteries exhibit two sources of inefficiency. First, some agents may benefit from trading probability shares. Second, outcomes may be “wasteful”: agents may receive nothing even if acceptable items remain unallocated. We bound both sources of inefficiency and show that each is eliminated by giving applicants a suitable number of tickets k: trades are never beneficial when k = 1, and waste is eliminated as [Formula: see text]. In addition, we show that the wastefulness of the k-ticket parallel lottery has some benefits: agents with strong preferences may prefer parallel lottery outcomes to those of any nonwasteful envy-free mechanism. These agents prefer small values of k, while agents with weak preferences prefer large values of k. Together, these results suggest that the k-ticket parallel lottery performs well under most circumstances and may be suitable for other settings where items are rationed. This paper was accepted by Gabriel Weintraub, revenue management and market analytics.

Dynamic Evaluation Design

A principal owns a firm, hires an agent of uncertain productivity, and designs a dynamic policy for evaluating his performance. The agent observes ongoing evaluations and decides when to quit. When not quitting, the agent is paid a wage that is linear in his expected productivity; the principal claims the residual performance. After quitting, the players secure fixed outside options. I show that equilibrium is Pareto efficient. For a broad class of performance technologies, the equilibrium wage deterministically grows with tenure. My analysis suggests that endogenous performance evaluation plays an important role in shaping careers in organizations. (JEL D21, D82, D83, J24, J31, J41, M51)

AN IMPLEMENTATION PROPOSAL OF INNOVATIVE PRICING IN GREEK COASTAL SHIPPING

Greek coastal shipping is an industry which passed from the state regulatory interference to market forces. Its fare structure (tariff) was based on average (or total) cost and distance was the representative cost variable. As it is an industry facing strong economies of scale, average cost is higher than marginal cost. This means that companies equalizing prices to marginal cost, following Pareto–efficient allocation of resources, are driven to losses and are forced to seek other methods of efficient pricing policy. The purpose of this article is to examine the implementation of “innovative” pricing in Greek coastal shipping. “Innovative” pricing contains applicable measures in order to increase ticket prices in “peak” periods without affecting the level of quality, the number of passengers and the market share. The analysis results show that average fare will not necessarily raise. Ticket increases may be accompanied by quantitative discounts in periods of low demand. In these cases, “season tickets” can be applied.

EXTRACTING DESIGN RECOMMENDATIONS FROM INTERACTIVE GENETIC ALGORITHM EXPERIMENTS: APPLICATION TO THE DESIGN OF SOUNDS FOR ELECTRIC VEHICLES

The integration of users' perception in the design process is and important challenge for the optimization of products. This study describes how design recommendations can be drawn, from a perceptual experiment with a panel of subjects using a multi-objective interactive genetic algorithm (IGA). The application concerns the bi-objective optimization of the unpleasantness and the detectability of sounds for electric vehicles (EV). After a description of the experimental protocol for the assessment of the detectability and the unpleasantness of EV sounds (listening test), a set of optimal sounds (Pareto efficient) is defined with an IGA experiment. The analysis of these sounds, based on a probabilistic analysis of the selection process, leads to the definition of design recommendations. A second listening test, involving recommended sounds but also other design proposals, allows an evaluation of the validity of the approach. Results show that the sounds recommended obtain interesting performance, in particular to improve the detectability of EV sounds.

On the Generic Uniqueness of Pareto-Efficient Solutions of Vector Optimization Problems

In this paper, the generic uniqueness of Pareto weakly efficient solutions, especially Pareto-efficient solutions, of vector optimization problems is studied by using the nonlinear and linear scalarization methods, and some further results on the generic uniqueness are proved. These results present that, for most of the vector optimization problems in the sense of the Baire category, the Pareto weakly efficient solution, especially the Pareto-efficient solution, is unique. Furthermore, based on these results, the generic Tykhonov well-posedness of vector optimization problems is given.

A Better Approach for Solving a Fuzzy Multiobjective Programming Problem by Level Sets

In this paper, we deal with the resolution of a fuzzy multiobjective programming problem using the level sets optimization. We compare it to other optimization strategies studied until now and we propose an algorithm to identify possible Pareto efficient optimal solutions.

A Better Approach for Solving a Fuzzy Multiobjective Programming Problem by Level Sets

In this paper we deal with the resolution of a fuzzy multiobjective programming problem using the level sets optimization. We compare it to other optimization strategies studied until now and we propose an algorithm to identify possible Pareto efficient optimal solutions.