Allocating deceased donor kidneys for transplant: problems, some proposed changes, and how can we get more donors?

Two recent NY Times stories discuss the allocation of deceased donor kidneys:

In Discarding of Kidneys, System Reveals Its Flaws

Kidney Transplant Committee Proposes Changes Aimed at Better Use of Donated Organs

A few different things are intertwined here: the long waiting lists, the congested process of offering kidneys and having them accepted or rejected and offered to the next person on the list, and the ordering of the list, which in turn might influence how often people need a second transplant, which comes back to how long the waiting lists are...

There are lots of interesting and important questions about how to most efficiently allocate the scarce supply (see e.g. Zenios et al.)

 But organ allocation has an unusual aspect: how organs are allocated may also influence the supply, by changing donation behavior. I'll be giving a seminar this afternoon on aspects of that question (in joint work with Judd Kessler):

 Mon, Sep 24, 3:30PM - 5:00PM,   Deceased Organ Donation and Allocation: 3 Experiments in Market Design, GSB E-104