Celebration of Ken Arrow at Stanford

October 9, 2017
Academic Tribute to Kenneth Arrow

Location: 

Frances C. Arrillaga Alumni Center, Stanford University

 Map

Admission: 

By invitation only

October 9, 2017

8:00am to 8:30am

Breakfast

8:30am to 8:40am

Welcoming Remarks

Presenter(s) : 

Alvin Roth, Douglas Bernheim, and Larry Kramer

8:40am to 9:00am

Discussion and celebration of the newly announced Nobel Prize winner

9:00am to 10:00am

Social Choice Panel

Presenter(s) : 

Eric Maskin, Kotaro Suzumura, Amartya Sen, and Salvador Barbera

Moderator: 

Roger Myerson

10:00am to 10:30am

Arrow's Broader Intellectual Contributions

Presenter(s) : 

Lawrence Lau, Mordecai Kurz and Eytan Sheshinski (Chaired by Matthew Jackson)

10:30am to 11:00am

Break

11:00am to 12:00pm

General Equilibrium Panel

Presenter(s) : 

John Geanakoplos, Robert Lucas, Herakles Polemarchakis, and Andreu Mas-Colell

Moderator: 

Chris Shannon

12:00pm to 12:20pm

Lunch Keynote I

Presenter(s) : 

Sir James Mirrlees (Chaired by John Shoven)

12:20pm to 1:20pm

Lunch

1:20pm to 1:40pm

Lunch Keynote II

Presenter(s) : 

Robert Solow (Chaired by Mark Duggan)

1:40pm to 2:00pm

Remarks on Behalf of Arrow's Graduate Students

Presenter(s) : 

Nancy Stokey and Ross Starr (Chaired by Alvin Roth)

2:00pm to 3:00pm

Health Economics Panel

Presenter(s) : 

Victor Fuchs, Alan Garber, Amy Finkelstein, and Sir Angus Deaton

Moderator: 

Victor Fuchs

3:00pm to 3:30pm

Break

3:30pm to 4:30pm

Finance Panel

Presenter(s) : 

Darrell Duffie, William Sharpe, Thorsten Hens, and Markus Brunnermeier

Moderator: 

Hugo Sonnenschein

4:30pm to 5:15pm

Thoughts on Arrow's Broader Influence on Social Science Research

Presenter(s) : 

Debra Satz, Richard Cottle, Sir Partha DasGupta and Joseph Stiglitz(Chaired by Matthew Jackson)

5:15pm to 6:15pm

Reception

6:15pm to 7:45pm

Dinner

Presenter(s) : 

Lawrence Summers

David Arrow
Andrew Arrow

Anita Arrow Summers

7:45pm to 8:30pm

Additional Tributes

Presenter(s) : 

Chaired by Jerry Green

Congratulations to Dick Thaler: 2017 Nobel Prize in Economics

Bounded rationality, bounded self control, and bounded selfishness are recognized today by the 2017 Nobel Prize in Economics, awarded to Dick Thaler.

(Some pedants will object to that sentence: there is no Dick Thaler, his correct name is Richard...:)

Congratulations, Dick. 

Uber's difficulties in London (and in general)

Here's an illuminating article on the difficulties Uber is having in London. It's hard to extract a few representative sentences, but the whole (longish) article is well worth reading.

Understanding Uber: It’s Not About The App

Medical careers as investments

From Statnews.com:

How much do doctors really make? Compare your salary to various specialties 

Marijuana in America--getting less repugnant with each election

Here's the story from which I copied the pictures below: America’s Marijuana Evolution

The latest Nobel Prize touching on organ donation--Kazuo Ishiguro and Never Let Me Go

The Nobel Prize in Literature was awarded today to Kazuo Ishiguro, whose 2005 novel Never Let Me Go is about a dystopia in which cloned children are raised to be organ donors...

Kidney black markets are persistent

Black markets in kidneys--like those for narcotic drugs--have resisted attempts to abolish them.

Here are two recent articles that explore some of the ways that they persist despite vigorous attempts to defeat them.

From the Hindustan Times:
Kidney racket: All about the scam busted at Delhi’s Batra hospital
From changing name, getting fake accent and Aadhar card, doctoring photos in family albums, the racketeers worked to a well thought out plan to pass off the kidney seller as a family member


From The Costa Rica Star:
Is Costa Rica at the Epicenter of a Global Black Market in Human Organs?
"Costa Rican doctors who have been charged with selling kidneys on the global black market appear to have received payments of up to $140,000 per procedure – some of which went to the doctors, some for hospital expenses, and some to Costa Rican “donors.”
...
"In February 2016, Costa Rican authorities brought formal charges against the doctors who participated in the organ transplant surgeries, and two others who aided in recruiting and paying low-income Costa Ricans to donate their kidneys.

Mora Palma has been charged with 14 counts of human trafficking (for harvesting organs from 14 individuals) and 16 counts of embezzlement for using public health system equipment and facilities for the procedures.

One of Mora Palma’s alleged victims, a Costan Rican National Police officer, Maureen Cordero Solano, apparently received 6 million colones (around $10,400) for one of her kidneys. She then is thought to have aided the doctors in recruiting others, receiving $1,000 for each donor she successfully brought in.

The other doctors were all Costa Ricans: Maximiliano Mauro Stamati and Fabián Fonseca Guzman (urologists), and Victor Hugo Monge (peripheral vascular specialist).

The operation was also aided by a Greek businessman, Dimosthenis Katsigiannis Karkasi, who would talk to Solano’s recruits further about donating a kidney. Donors were offered  up to 10,000,000 colones (around $17,400). It is illegal in Costa Rica, as in most countries, to pay people for donating a vital organ"

The effect of paying the travel expenses of living kidney donors: Schnier et al. on NLDAC

The National Living Donor Assistance Center (NLDAC) can only give a very little money to economically deprived kidney donors who are donating to economically deprived recipients. But that has an effect. Here's a recent paper:

SUBSIDIZING ALTRUISM IN LIVING ORGAN DONATION
Kurt E. Schnier, Robert M. Merion, Nicole Turgeon and David Howard, Economic Inquiry
Version of Record online: 30 AUG 2017
DOI: 10.1111/ecin.12488

Abstract
The current supply of deceased donor organs is insufficient to meet the growing demand for transplantable organs. Consequently, candidates for kidney transplantation are encouraged to find a living donor. In 2008, the Department of Health and Human Services began to reimburse donors' travel-related expenses via the National Living Donor Assistance Center (NLDAC). Using variation in transplant centers' applications for donor assistance, we use a difference-in-difference model to estimate the relationship between the NLDAC and living donor kidney transplants. We find that among participating transplant centers, the program increased the number of living donor kidney transplants by approximately 14%.

Ethics and Market Design by Shengwu Li

Here's a take on an important and elusive question, by someone well qualified to discuss both ethics and market design. (That said, I have no expectation of ever seeing the last word on this particular subject, and that seems to be Shengwu's position too...)

Ethics and Market Design, by Shengwu Li
forthcoming, Oxford Review of Economic Policy

The paper begins with these two quotes:

[. . . ] just as there is a chemical engineering literature (and not just literature about theoretical and laboratory chemistry) and a medical literature (and not just a biology literature), economists need to develop a scientific literature concerned with practical problems of design. (Roth and Peranson, 1999)

It is, in fact, arguable that economics has had two rather different origins [. . . ] concerned respectively with ‘ethics’ on the one hand, and with what may be called ‘engineering’ on the other. (Sen, 1987) 

Global kidney exchange debated in the October issue of American Journal of Transplantation

The October issue of the AJT starts off with a news report, and ends with six letters to the editor (3 of which are replies by us to the letters and to the editorial that was published along with our original article in the March 2017 issue).

The AJT Report

1.     You have free access to this content

Global Kidney Exchange: Overcoming the Barrier of Poverty (pages 2499–2500)

Lara C. Pullen

Version of Record online: 28 SEP 2017 | DOI: 10.1111/ajt.14469

This month's installment of “The AJT Report” debates the benefits, ethics and sustainability of Global Kidney Exchange. We also look at efforts to shore kidney paired donation implementation in the United States.

o   Abstract

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o   PDF(3856K)

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o   References

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Letters to the Editor

1.     You have free access to this content

Kidney Paired-Donation Program Versus Global Kidney Exchange in India (pages 2740–2741)

V. Kute, R. M. Jindal and N. Prasad

Version of Record online: 22 MAY 2017 | DOI: 10.1111/ajt.14324

o   Abstract

o   Article

o   PDF(26K)

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2.     You have free access to this content

Comment: Kidney Exchange to Overcome Financial Barriers to Kidney Transplantation (page 2742)

L. S. Baines and R. M. Jindal

Version of Record online: 15 MAY 2017 | DOI: 10.1111/ajt.14325

o   Abstract

o   Article

o   PDF(45K)

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3.     You have free access to this content

Global kidney exchange: Financially incompatible pairs are not transplantable compatible pairs (pages 2743–2744)

M. A. Rees, S. R. Paloyo, A. E. Roth, K. D. Krawiec, O. Ekwenna, C. L. Marsh, A. J. Wenig and T. B. Dunn

Version of Record online: 1 SEP 2017 | DOI: 10.1111/ajt.14451

o   Abstract

o   Article

o   PDF(162K)

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o   References

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4.     You have free access to this content

Opposition to irresponsible global kidney exchange (pages 2745–2746)

Francis L. Delmonico and Nancy L. Ascher

Version of Record online: 2 SEP 2017 | DOI: 10.1111/ajt.14473

o   Abstract

o   Article

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o   .     You have free access to this content

People should not be banned from transplantation only because of their country of origin (pages 2747–2748)

Alvin E. Roth, Kimberly D. Krawiec, Siegfredo Paloyo, Obi Ekwenna, Christopher L. Marsh, Alexandra J. Wenig, Ty B. Dunn and Michael A. Rees

Version of Record online: 13 SEP 2017 | DOI: 10.1111/ajt.14485

o   Abstract

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6.     You have free access to this content

Open dialogue between professionals with different opinions builds the best policy (page 2749)

Ignazio R. Marino, Alvin E. Roth, Michael A. Rees and Cataldo Doria

Version of Record online: 11 SEP 2017 | DOI: 10.1111/ajt.14484

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Market design in the September Econometrica

The September Econometrica contains two very different market design papers.

Research Design Meets Market Design: Using Centralized Assignment for Impact Evaluation

DOI: 10.3982/ECTA13925
p. 1373-1432

Atila Abdulkadiroğlu, Joshua D. Angrist, Yusuke Narita, Parag A. Pathak

A growing number of school districts use centralized assignment mechanisms to allocate school seats in a manner that reflects student preferences and school priorities. Many of these assignment schemes use lotteries to ration seats when schools are oversubscribed. The resulting random assignment opens the door to credible quasi‐experimental research designs for the evaluation of school effectiveness. Yet the question of how best to separate the lottery‐generated randomization integral to such designs from non‐random preferences and priorities remains open. This paper develops easily‐implemented empirical strategies that fully exploit the random assignment embedded in a wide class of mechanisms, while also revealing why seats are randomized at one school but not another. We use these methods to evaluate charter schools in Denver, one of a growing number of districts that combine charter and traditional public schools in a unified assignment system. The resulting estimates show large achievement gains from charter school attendance. Our approach generates efficiency gains over ad hoc methods, such as those that focus on schools ranked first, while also identifying a more representative average causal effect. We also show how to use centralized assignment mechanisms to identify causal effects in models with multiple school sectors. 
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Dual-Donor Organ Exchange

DOI: 10.3982/ECTA13971
p. 1645-1671

Haluk Ergin, Tayfun Sönmez, M. Utku Ünver

Owing to the worldwide shortage of deceased‐donor organs for transplantation, living donations have become a significant source of transplant organs. However, not all willing donors can donate to their intended recipients because of medical incompatibilities. These incompatibilities can be overcome by an exchange of donors between patients. For kidneys, such exchanges have become widespread in the last decade with the introduction of optimization and market design techniques to kidney exchange. A small but growing number of liver exchanges have also been conducted. Over the last two decades, a number of transplantation procedures emerged where organs from two living donors are transplanted to a single patient. Prominent examples include dual‐graft liver transplantation, lobar lung transplantation, and simultaneous liver‐kidney transplantation. Exchange, however, has been neither practiced nor introduced in this context. We introduce dual‐donor organ exchange as a novel transplantation modality, and through simulations show that living‐donor transplants can be significantly increased through such exchanges. We also provide a simple theoretical model for dual‐donor organ exchange and introduce optimal exchange mechanisms under various logistical constraints. 

More on kidney transplantation and kidney exchange in Mexico

In La Prensa: Donación de órganos, insuficiente en México

From Google translate:
"Arturo Dib Kuri, director general of Pro-Renal and pioneer of the transplant program in Mexico, reported that the cadaveric donation in Mexico, despite the efforts that have been made to promote it, does not reach more than 400 donations a year, which is totally insufficient for the 13 thousand patients on the waiting list.
...
"He indicated that, according to INEGI, 120,000 Mexicans suffer from renal insufficiency, which places it as the fifth cause of death in Mexico.

"Érick Vélez, for his part, explained that chronic renal failure is a progressive disease, caused mainly by diabetes and hypertension. He reported that in Mexico there are about 60 thousand people in dialysis treatment, which translates into an economic cost of 250 thousand dollars annually, in a comparison between public, social and private hospitals.

"Meanwhile, Dr. Dib Kuri noted that only 24% of patients manage to access an organ annually through two channels: 1) cadaveric donation and 2) donation among compatible living people.

"Dib Kuri said that 1 in 3 Mexicans who require a kidney transplant, has a family member or close friend willing to donate a kidney voluntarily.

"However, the procedure can not be completed because recipient and donor are genetically incompatible, which generates a great feeling of frustration.

"He said that finding genetically identical or similar beings is extremely difficult, but currently in Pro-Renal uses an algorithm, which can identify highly compatible donors, "almost as if it were a twin brother."

"This is a third way to carry out the renal transplantation called Donation Renal [kidney exchange], a novel alternative that, through technology, allows pairs of patients and their incompatible donors, can identify and find other couples in the same situation , with which they are compatible, said the specialist.

"Such a procedure works thanks to a sophisticated Compatibility Algorithm, which allows the analysis of hundreds of genetic variables to accurately determine the genetic match between individuals, even among unknown, unrelated individuals located in different geographic locations.
...
"He mentioned that Pro-Renal AC works hand in hand with the Alliance for Paired Kidney Donation, the pioneering organization in the field that has more than 3,500 registered couples and experience of more than 350 transplants performed."

Interviewing in matching markets by Robin Lee and Michael Schwarz

We still know too little about interviewing as a part of matching markets, but here's a paper (that has been around for a while but is now published) that takes an interesting approach.

Interviewing in two-sided matching markets

By:Lee, RS (Lee, Robin S.); Schwarz, M (Schwarz, Michael)

RAND JOURNAL OF ECONOMICS

Volume: 48   

Issue: 3  

Pages: 835-855

DOI: 10.1111/1756-2171.12193

Abstract

We introduce the interview assignment problem, which generalizes classic one-to-one matching models by introducing a stage of costly information acquisition. Firms learn preferences over workers via costly interviews. Even if all firms and workers conduct the same number of interviews, realized unemployment depends also on the extent to which agents share common interviewing partners. We introduce the concept of overlap that captures this notion and prove that unemployment is minimized with perfect overlap: that is, if two firms interview any common worker, they interview the exact same set of workers.

Restricting choice to improve matching by Yash Kanoria and Daniela Saban

Congestion, sometimes in the form of search costs, is a big deal in many matching markets.  Here are some interesting thoughts on that...

Facilitating the Search for Partners on Matching Platforms: Restricting Agents' Actions

Stanford University Graduate School of Business Research Paper No. 17-53

71 Pages Posted: 22 Jul 2017  

Yash Kanoria

Columbia Business School - Decision Risk and Operations

Daniela Saban

Stanford Graduate School of Business

 Abstract

Two-sided matching platforms, such as those for labor, accommodation, dating, and taxi hailing, can control and optimize over many aspects of the search for partners. To understand how the search for partners should be designed, we consider a dynamic two-sided search model with strategic agents who must spend a cost to discover their value for each potential partner. We find that in many settings, the platform can mitigate wasteful search effort by restricting what agents can see/do. Surprisingly, simple restrictions can improve social welfare even when screening costs are small, and agents on each side are ex-ante homogeneous. In asymmetric markets where agents on one side have a tendency to be more selective (due to smaller screening costs or greater market power), the platform should force the more selective side of the market to reach out first, by explicitly disallowing the less selective side from doing so. This allows the agents on the less selective side to exercise more choice in equilibrium. When agents are vertically differentiated, the platform can significantly improve welfare even in the limit of vanishing screening costs, by forcing one side of the market to propose and by hiding quality information. Furthermore, a Pareto improvement in welfare is possible in this limit.

Kidney exchange in Europe: 3rd Workshop of the European Network for Collaboration in Kidney Exchange Programmes (ENCKEP)

 The international participation in this conference is a sign of the growing reach of kidney exchange:

3rd Workshop of the European Network for Collaboration in Kidney Exchange Programmes (ENCKEP)

Program:
Thursday, September 28, 2017
9h15 Registration
09h40 Welcome and Introduction

10h10 Ruthanne Leishman (UNOS)

10h55 Lisa Burnapp and Rachel Johnson (desensitisation)

11h15 Coffee break

11h45 Joke Roodnat (Dutch KEP)

12h15 Tommy Andersson (Swedish KEP and STEP update)

13h00 Lunch (at workshop venue)

14h30 Round-table: Barriers to Establishing KEPs
Facilitator: Lisa Burnapp (UK)
Participants: Eyjólfur Ásgeirsson (Iceland)
Haris Gavranovic (Bosnia and Herzegovina)
Balázs Nemes (Hungary)
Axel Rahmel (Germany)
Mikko Salonen (Finland)


16h00 Coffee break

16h30 David Manlove (UK KEP)

17h00 Bart Smeulders (Belgian KEP)

17h20 María Valentín and Francesc Castro" (Spanish KEP)

18h00 Close

Friday, September 29, 2017

09h30 Christian Jacquelinet (French KEP)

10h00 Xenia Klimentova (Portuguese KEP)

10h30 Pavel Chromy / Jiri Fronek (Czech/Austrian KEP)

11h00 Rafal Kieszek (Polish KEP)

11:30 Coffee break

12h00 Discussion: Next handbook, Skype Joris, Global Kidney Exchange, Financial Aspects of KEPs, ...

OCT 12 Drinks & Debate: How can NYC's high school admissions process be more fair? by Chalkbeat

Here's an invitation to a discussion of NYC's highschool admission system, and some of the admissions criteria of particular schools: OCT 12 Drinks & Debate: How can NYC's high school admissions process be more fair?  by Chalkbeat

New York City’s high school system is built on choice, but in reality many of the city’s low-income students of color are shut out of its top schools.

Now, the city is trying to figure out how to give more students a fair shot — and in the process make schools more diverse. Chalkbeat NY has been following this story closely, and now we’re inviting people from across the system to join us in a conversation about what can be done to improve this process.

Catch up with our reporters and connect with others who care about New York City schools at this solutions-oriented panel discussion and networking event. Your $17 ticket donation supports Chalkbeat, and drinks and appetizers are on us! (Two drink tickets for either beer or wine will be provided to guests over 21 years old.)

Happy hour will begin at 6 p.m., followed by a panel discussion at 6:45 with additional time for mingling once the panel wraps.

We look forward to seeing you there!

Panelists

- Amy Basile, Executive Director of High School Admissions
- Monica Disare, Chalkbeat NY reporter (moderator)
- Tanesha Grant, Harlem-based parent of a 9th grader at Urban Assembly School for the Performing Arts
- Jennifer Jennings, Professor of Sociology and Public Affairs at Princeton who studied New York City's high school admissions process
- Holliday Senquiz, 9th grade student at Repertory Company High School for Theatre Arts
- Rhea Wong, Executive Director of Breakthrough NY- Lianna Wright, Executive Director of Enrollment Research and Policy

**************

Here's a related blog post, with some links, that gives the current system a pretty good review:The New York City High School Application Process: Is It Fair to Students? Can It Be Improved?

More on kidney exchange chains initiated by deceased donors

Earlier I noted that there is a new UNOS proposal: Allowing Deceased Donor-Initiated Kidney Paired Donation (KPD) Chains out for public comment.  Now there are a bunch of comments, ranging from supportive to concerned to confused: 
https://optn.transplant.hrsa.gov/governance/public-comment/deceased-donor-initiated-kpd-chains/

Decriminalization of narcotics in Portugal, an update

Kristof in the NYT on narcotics policy and outcomes in Portugal:
How to Win a War on Drugs: Portugal treats addiction as a disease, not a

"Decades ago, the United States and Portugal both struggled with illicit drugs and took decisive action — in diametrically opposite directions. The U.S. cracked down vigorously, spending billions of dollars incarcerating drug users. In contrast, Portugal undertook a monumental experiment: It decriminalized the use of all drugs in 2001, even heroin and cocaine, and unleashed a major public health campaign to tackle addiction. Ever since in Portugal, drug addiction has been treated more as a medical challenge than as a criminal justice issue.

"After more than 15 years, it’s clear which approach worked better. The United States drug policy failed spectacularly, with about as many Americans dying last year of overdoses — around 64,000 — as were killed in the Vietnam, Afghanistan and Iraq Wars combined.
...
"The number of Portuguese dying from overdoses plunged more than 85 percent before rising a bit in the aftermath of the European economic crisis of recent years. Even so, Portugal’s drug mortality rate is the lowest in Western Europe — one-tenth the rate of Britain or Denmark — and about one-fiftieth the latest number for the U.S."