IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/mateco/v91y2020icp111-120.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Allocation inequality in cost sharing problem

Author

Listed:
  • Chen, Zhi
  • Hu, Zhenyu
  • Tang, Qinshen

Abstract

This paper considers the problem of cost sharing, in which a coalition of agents, each endowed with an input, shares the output cost incurred from the total inputs of the coalition. Two allocations—average cost pricing and the Shapley value—are arguably the two most widely studied solution concepts to this problem. It is well known in the literature that the two allocations can be respectively characterized by different sets of axioms and they share many properties that are deemed reasonable. We seek to bridge the two allocations from a different angle–allocation inequality. We use the partial order: Lorenz order (or majorization) to characterize allocation inequality and we derive simple conditions under which one allocation Lorenz dominates (or is majorized by) the other. Examples are given to show that the two allocations are not always comparable by Lorenz order. Our proof, built on solving minimization problems of certain Schur-convex or Schur-concave objective functions over input vectors, may be of independent interest.

Suggested Citation

  • Chen, Zhi & Hu, Zhenyu & Tang, Qinshen, 2020. "Allocation inequality in cost sharing problem," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(C), pages 111-120.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:mateco:v:91:y:2020:i:c:p:111-120
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jmateco.2020.09.006
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0304406820301038
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jmateco.2020.09.006?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 search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Dutta, Bhaskar & Ray, Debraj, 1989. "A Concept of Egalitarianism under Participation Constraints," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 57(3), pages 615-635, May.
    2. Xin Chen & Jiawei Zhang, 2009. "A Stochastic Programming Duality Approach to Inventory Centralization Games," Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 57(4), pages 840-851, August.
    3. Moulin, Herve, 1996. "Cost Sharing under Increasing Returns: A Comparison of Simple Mechanisms," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 13(2), pages 225-251, April.
    4. Moulin, Herve & Shenker, Scott, 1992. "Serial Cost Sharing," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 60(5), pages 1009-1037, September.
    5. Gary D. Eppen, 1979. "Note--Effects of Centralization on Expected Costs in a Multi-Location Newsboy Problem," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 25(5), pages 498-501, May.
    6. Hartman, Bruce C. & Dror, Moshe & Shaked, Moshe, 2000. "Cores of Inventory Centralization Games," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 31(1), pages 26-49, April.
    7. Martin Shubik, 1962. "Incentives, Decentralized Control, the Assignment of Joint Costs and Internal Pricing," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 8(3), pages 325-343, April.
    8. Hart, Sergiu & Mas-Colell, Andreu, 1989. "Potential, Value, and Consistency," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 57(3), pages 589-614, May.
    9. Moulin Herve & Shenker Scott, 1994. "Average Cost Pricing versus Serial Cost Sharing: An Axiomatic Comparison," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 64(1), pages 178-201, October.
    10. Pham, Ngoc Anh, 2019. "Lorenz comparison between Increasing serial and Shapley value cost-sharing rules," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 179(C), pages 49-52.
    11. Hougaard, Jens Leth & Thorlund-Petersen, Lars, 2001. "Mixed serial cost sharing," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 41(1), pages 51-68, January.
    12. CHAMPSAUR, Paul, 1975. "How to share the cost of a public good?," LIDAM Reprints CORE 268, Université catholique de Louvain, Center for Operations Research and Econometrics (CORE).
    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. Pongou, Roland & Tondji, Jean-Baptiste, 2024. "The reciprocity set," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 112(C).

    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. Pham, Ngoc Anh, 2019. "Lorenz comparison between Increasing serial and Shapley value cost-sharing rules," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 179(C), pages 49-52.
    2. Moulin, Herve, 2002. "Axiomatic cost and surplus sharing," Handbook of Social Choice and Welfare, in: K. J. Arrow & A. K. Sen & K. Suzumura (ed.), Handbook of Social Choice and Welfare, edition 1, volume 1, chapter 6, pages 289-357, Elsevier.
    3. Maurice Koster, 2012. "Consistent cost sharing," Mathematical Methods of Operations Research, Springer;Gesellschaft für Operations Research (GOR);Nederlands Genootschap voor Besliskunde (NGB), vol. 75(1), pages 1-28, February.
    4. Koster, M., 2005. "Sharing Variable Returns of Cooperation," CeNDEF Working Papers 05-06, Universiteit van Amsterdam, Center for Nonlinear Dynamics in Economics and Finance.
    5. Friedman, Eric & Moulin, Herve, 1999. "Three Methods to Share Joint Costs or Surplus," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 87(2), pages 275-312, August.
    6. Watts, Alison, 2002. "Uniqueness of equilibrium in cost sharing games," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 37(1), pages 47-70, February.
    7. Koster, M., 2009. "Contracts, cost sharing and consistency," CeNDEF Working Papers 09-04, Universiteit van Amsterdam, Center for Nonlinear Dynamics in Economics and Finance.
    8. Koster, M., 2005. "Cost Sharing, Differential Games, and the Moulin-Shenker Rule," CeNDEF Working Papers 05-07, Universiteit van Amsterdam, Center for Nonlinear Dynamics in Economics and Finance.
    9. Bergantiños, Gustavo & Valencia-Toledo, Alfredo & Vidal-Puga, Juan, 2016. "Consistency in PERT problems," MPRA Paper 68973, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    10. Hougaard, Jens Leth & Thorlund-Petersen, Lars, 2001. "Mixed serial cost sharing," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 41(1), pages 51-68, January.
    11. Hervé Moulin & Yves Sprumont, 2007. "Fair allocation of production externalities : recent results," Revue d'économie politique, Dalloz, vol. 117(1), pages 7-36.
    12. Justin Leroux, 2006. "A discussion of the consistency axiom in cost-allocation problems," Cahiers de recherche 06-13, HEC Montréal, Institut d'économie appliquée.
    13. M. Albizuri & M. Álvarez-Mozos, 2016. "The $$a$$ a -serial cost sharing rule," Central European Journal of Operations Research, Springer;Slovak Society for Operations Research;Hungarian Operational Research Society;Czech Society for Operations Research;Österr. Gesellschaft für Operations Research (ÖGOR);Slovenian Society Informatika - Section for Operational Research;Croatian Operational Research Society, vol. 24(1), pages 73-86, March.
    14. Koster, M.A.L., 1998. "Multi-Service Serial Cost Sharing : A Characterization of the Moulin-Shenker Rule," Discussion Paper 1998-06, Tilburg University, Center for Economic Research.
    15. Hervé Moulin & Alison Watts, 1996. "Two versions of the tragedy of the commons," Review of Economic Design, Springer;Society for Economic Design, vol. 2(1), pages 399-421, December.
    16. Moulin, Herve & Sprumont, Yves, 2006. "Responsibility and cross-subsidization in cost sharing," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 55(1), pages 152-188, April.
    17. Jop Schouten & Mirjam GrooteSchaarsberg & Peter Borm, 2024. "Cost sharing methods for capacity restricted cooperative purchasing situations," Review of Economic Design, Springer;Society for Economic Design, vol. 28(2), pages 347-390, June.
    18. Sprumont, Yves, 2000. "Coherent Cost-Sharing Rules," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 33(1), pages 126-144, October.
    19. Tejedo, Cyril & Truchon, Michel, 2002. "Serial cost sharing in multidimensional contexts," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 44(3), pages 277-299, December.
    20. Sprumont, Yves, 1998. "Ordinal Cost Sharing," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 81(1), pages 126-162, July.

    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:eee:mateco:v:91:y:2020:i:c:p:111-120. 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: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/jmateco .

    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.