IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/ecm/quante/v1y2010i1p187-202.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

When consensus choice dominates individualism: Jensen's inequality and collective decisions under uncertainty

Author

Listed:
  • Charles F. Manski

Abstract

Research on collective provision of private goods has focused on distributional considerations. This paper studies a class of problems of decision under uncertainty in which the argument for collective choice emerges from the mathematics of aggregating individual payoffs. Consider decision making when each member of a population has the same objective function, which depends on an unknown state of nature. If agents knew the state of nature, they would make the same decision. However, they may have different beliefs or may use different decision criteria. Hence, they may choose different actions even though they share the same objective. Let the set of feasible actions be convex and the objective function be concave in actions, for all states of nature. Then Jensen's inequality implies that consensus choice of the mean privately-chosen action yields a larger aggregate payoff than does individualistic decision making, in all states of nature. If payoffs are transferable, the aggregate payoff from consensus choice may be allocated to Pareto dominate individualistic decision making, in all states of nature. I develop these ideas. I also use Jensen's inequality to show that a planner with the power to assign actions to the members of the population should not diversify. Finally, I give a version of the collective choice result that holds with consensus choice of the median rather than mean action.
(This abstract was borrowed from another version of this item.)

Suggested Citation

  • Charles F. Manski, 2010. "When consensus choice dominates individualism: Jensen's inequality and collective decisions under uncertainty," Quantitative Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 1(1), pages 187-202, July.
    • Handle: RePEc:ecm:quante:v:1:y:2010:i:1:p:187-202
    DOI: QE5
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/?????/QE5
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/QE5?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to look for a different version below or search for a different version of it.

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Bruce, Neil & Waldman, Michael, 1991. "Transfers in Kind: Why They Can Be Efficient and Nonpaternalistic," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 81(5), pages 1345-1351, December.
    2. Hanming Fang & Peter Norman, 2014. "Toward an efficiency rationale for the public provision of private goods," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 56(2), pages 375-408, June.
    3. Coate, Stephen, 1995. "Altruism, the Samaritan's Dilemma, and Government Transfer Policy," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 85(1), pages 46-57, March.
    4. Clemen, Robert T., 1989. "Combining forecasts: A review and annotated bibliography," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 5(4), pages 559-583.
    5. repec:bla:scandj:v:97:y:1995:i:4:p:547-67 is not listed on IDEAS
    6. Richard P. Larrick & Jack B. Soll, 2006. "Intuitions About Combining Opinions: Misappreciation of the Averaging Principle," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 52(1), pages 111-127, January.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Thomas Kniesner & W. Viscusi & James Ziliak, 2010. "Policy relevant heterogeneity in the value of statistical life: New evidence from panel data quantile regressions," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 40(1), pages 15-31, February.
    2. Hanming Fang & Peter Norman, 2014. "Toward an efficiency rationale for the public provision of private goods," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 56(2), pages 375-408, June.
    3. Moshe Ben-Akiva & André Palma & Daniel McFadden & Maya Abou-Zeid & Pierre-André Chiappori & Matthieu Lapparent & Steven Durlauf & Mogens Fosgerau & Daisuke Fukuda & Stephane Hess & Charles Manski & Ar, 2012. "Process and context in choice models," Marketing Letters, Springer, vol. 23(2), pages 439-456, June.
    4. Malte Knüppel & Fabian Krüger, 2022. "Forecast uncertainty, disagreement, and the linear pool," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 37(1), pages 23-41, January.
    5. Konstadinos G. Goulias & Ram M. Pendyala, 2014. "Choice context," Chapters, in: Stephane Hess & Andrew Daly (ed.), Handbook of Choice Modelling, chapter 5, pages 101-130, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    6. Nir Billfeld & Moshe Kim, 2019. "Semiparametric correction for endogenous truncation bias with Vox Populi based participation decision," Papers 1902.06286, arXiv.org.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Hanming Fang & Peter Norman, 2014. "Toward an efficiency rationale for the public provision of private goods," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 56(2), pages 375-408, June.
    2. Armstrong, J. Scott & Green, Kesten C. & Graefe, Andreas, 2015. "Golden rule of forecasting: Be conservative," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 68(8), pages 1717-1731.
    3. Vicky Barham & Rose Anne Devlin & Olga Milliken, 2016. "Genetic Health Risks: The Case for Universal Public Health Insurance," Working Papers 1605E, University of Ottawa, Department of Economics.
    4. Johan Lagerl–f, 2004. "Efficiency-enhancing signalling in the Samaritan's dilemma," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 114(492), pages 55-69, January.
    5. repec:cup:judgdm:v:8:y:2013:i:2:p:91-105 is not listed on IDEAS
    6. Tatyana Deryugina & Barrett Kirwan, 2018. "Does The Samaritan'S Dilemma Matter? Evidence From U.S. Agriculture," Economic Inquiry, Western Economic Association International, vol. 56(2), pages 983-1006, April.
    7. Patrick Afflerbach & Christopher Dun & Henner Gimpel & Dominik Parak & Johannes Seyfried, 2021. "A Simulation-Based Approach to Understanding the Wisdom of Crowds Phenomenon in Aggregating Expert Judgment," Business & Information Systems Engineering: The International Journal of WIRTSCHAFTSINFORMATIK, Springer;Gesellschaft für Informatik e.V. (GI), vol. 63(4), pages 329-348, August.
    8. Julia A. Minson & Jennifer S. Mueller & Richard P. Larrick, 2018. "The Contingent Wisdom of Dyads: When Discussion Enhances vs. Undermines the Accuracy of Collaborative Judgments," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 64(9), pages 4177-4192, September.
    9. Dijkstra, Bouwe R., 2007. "Samaritan versus rotten kid: Another look," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 64(1), pages 91-110, September.
    10. Maria G. Perozek, 2005. "Escaping the Samaritan's Dilemma: implications of a dynamic model of altruistic intergenerational transfers," Finance and Economics Discussion Series 2005-67, Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (U.S.).
    11. Wang, Xiaoqian & Hyndman, Rob J. & Li, Feng & Kang, Yanfei, 2023. "Forecast combinations: An over 50-year review," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 39(4), pages 1518-1547.
    12. Graefe, Andreas, 2023. "Embrace the differences: Revisiting the PollyVote method of combining forecasts for U.S. presidential elections (2004 to 2020)," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 39(1), pages 170-177.
    13. Alain Marciano, 2014. "Exploitation, Mutual Advantage and The Myth of the Samaritan's Dilemma," ICER Working Papers 10-2014, ICER - International Centre for Economic Research.
    14. Johannes Müller-Trede & Shoham Choshen-Hillel & Meir Barneron & Ilan Yaniv, 2018. "The Wisdom of Crowds in Matters of Taste," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 64(4), pages 1779-1803, April.
    15. Graefe, Andreas & Armstrong, J. Scott & Jones, Randall J. & Cuzán, Alfred G., 2014. "Combining forecasts: An application to elections," International Journal of Forecasting, Elsevier, vol. 30(1), pages 43-54.
    16. Kausel, Edgar E. & Culbertson, Satoris S. & Leiva, Pedro I. & Slaughter, Jerel E. & Jackson, Alexander T., 2015. "Too arrogant for their own good? Why and when narcissists dismiss advice," Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, Elsevier, vol. 131(C), pages 33-50.
    17. Torsvik, Gaute, 2005. "Foreign economic aid; should donors cooperate?," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 77(2), pages 503-515, August.
    18. Blomquist, Soren & Christiansen, Vidar, 1999. "The political economy of publicly provided private goods," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 73(1), pages 31-54, July.
    19. Albert E. Mannes, 2009. "Are We Wise About the Wisdom of Crowds? The Use of Group Judgments in Belief Revision," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 55(8), pages 1267-1279, August.
    20. Ralph Chami & Connel Fullenkamp & Samir Jahjah, 2005. "Are Immigrant Remittance Flows a Source of Capital for Development?," IMF Staff Papers, Palgrave Macmillan, vol. 52(1), pages 55-81, April.
    21. Amegashie, J. Atsu & Ouattara, Bazoumanna & Strobl, Eric, 2007. "Moral Hazard and the Composition of Transfers: Theory with an Application to Foreign Aid," MPRA Paper 3158, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 06 May 2007.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • D7 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making
    • D81 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Criteria for Decision-Making under Risk and Uncertainty
    • H42 - Public Economics - - Publicly Provided Goods - - - Publicly Provided Private Goods

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:ecm:quante:v:1:y:2010:i:1:p:187-202. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Wiley Content Delivery (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/essssea.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.