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On Stability and Efficiency in School Choice Problems

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  • Alcalde, Jose
  • Romero-Medina, Antonio

Abstract

This paper proposes a way to allocate students to schools such that conciliates Pareto efficiency and stability. Taking as a starting point the recent reform proposed by the Boston School Committee, we propose a marginal modification to reach our objective redefine how students are prioritize. Our proposal is to allow schools to prioritize only a small set of students an then use a common priority order for the rest. Under this condition we propose a score based priority ranking that makes the output of the new Boston Mechanism Pareto efficient and stable.

Suggested Citation

  • Alcalde, Jose & Romero-Medina, Antonio, 2011. "On Stability and Efficiency in School Choice Problems," MPRA Paper 28831, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    • Handle: RePEc:pra:mprapa:28831
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    Cited by:

    1. Mustafa Oğuz Afacan & Umut Mert Dur, 2020. "Constrained stability in two-sided matching markets," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 55(3), pages 477-494, October.
    2. Ehlers, Lars & Hafalir, Isa E. & Yenmez, M. Bumin & Yildirim, Muhammed A., 2014. "School choice with controlled choice constraints: Hard bounds versus soft bounds," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 153(C), pages 648-683.
    3. Rodríguez-Álvarez, Carmelo & Romero-Medina, Antonio, 2024. "School choice with transferable student characteristics," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 143(C), pages 103-124.
    4. Yuen Leng Chow & Isa E. Hafalir & Abdullah Yavas, 2015. "Auction versus Negotiated Sale: Evidence from Real Estate Sales," Real Estate Economics, American Real Estate and Urban Economics Association, vol. 43(2), pages 432-470, June.
    5. José Alcalde & Antonio Romero-Medina, 2017. "Fair student placement," Theory and Decision, Springer, vol. 83(2), pages 293-307, August.
    6. Doğan, Battal, 2016. "Responsive affirmative action in school choice," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 165(C), pages 69-105.
    7. Alcalde, Jose & Subiza, Begoña, 2011. "On Integration Policies and Schooling," MPRA Paper 29145, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    8. Alcalde, Jose & Silva-Reus, José Ángel, 2013. "Allocating via Priorities," QM&ET Working Papers 13-3, University of Alicante, D. Quantitative Methods and Economic Theory.
    9. Han, Xiang, 2018. "Stable and efficient resource allocation under weak priorities," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 107(C), pages 1-20.
    10. José Alcalde & Begoña Subiza, 2014. "Affirmative action and school choice," International Journal of Economic Theory, The International Society for Economic Theory, vol. 10(3), pages 295-312, September.
    11. Qianfeng Tang & Yongchao Zhang, 2021. "Weak stability and Pareto efficiency in school choice," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 71(2), pages 533-552, March.
    12. Troyan, Peter & Morrill, Thayer, 2020. "Obvious manipulations," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 185(C).
    13. Imamura, Kenzo & Kawase, Yasushi, 2024. "Efficient matching under general constraints," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 145(C), pages 197-207.
    14. Troyan, Peter & Delacrétaz, David & Kloosterman, Andrew, 2020. "Essentially stable matchings," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 120(C), pages 370-390.
    15. Dur, Umut Mert & Morrill, Thayer, 2020. "What you don't know can help you in school assignment," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 120(C), pages 246-256.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    School allocation problem; Pareto efficient matching;

    JEL classification:

    • D71 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Social Choice; Clubs; Committees; Associations
    • C71 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Cooperative Games
    • C72 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Noncooperative Games

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