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Belief-averaging and relative utilitarianism

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  • Brandl, Florian

Abstract

We consider social welfare functions when the preferences of individual agents and society maximize subjective expected utility in the tradition of Savage. A system of axioms is introduced whose unique solution is the social welfare function that averages the agents' beliefs and sums up their utility functions, normalized to have the same range. The first distinguishing axiom requires positive association of society's preferences with the agents' preferences for acts about which beliefs agree. The second is a weakening of Arrow's independence of irrelevant alternatives that only applies to non-redundant acts.

Suggested Citation

  • Brandl, Florian, 2021. "Belief-averaging and relative utilitarianism," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 198(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jetheo:v:198:y:2021:i:c:s002205312100185x
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jet.2021.105368
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Dietrich, Franz, 2021. "Fully Bayesian aggregation," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 194(C).
    2. Pivato, Marcus, 2022. "Bayesian social aggregation with accumulating evidence," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 200(C).

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Uncertainty; Subjective expected utility; Pareto optimality; Relative utilitarianism;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D71 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Social Choice; Clubs; Committees; Associations
    • D81 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Criteria for Decision-Making under Risk and Uncertainty

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