NBER market design workshop at Stanford, tomorrow and Saturday

 Tomorrow and Saturday, market design at Stanford...

NBER Market Design Working Group Meeting, Fall 2024   DATE October 18-19, 2024

LOCATION SIEPR, Stanford University, Koret-Taube Conference Center, 366 Galvez Street

ORGANIZERS Michael Ostrovsky and Parag A. Pathak

  Format: 35 minute presentation, followed by 10 minute discussion.

Friday, October 18

9:00 am Continental Breakfast

9:30 am Designing Dynamic Reassignment Mechanisms: Evidence from GP Allocation, Ingrid Huitfeldt, University of Oslo, Victoria Marone, University of Texas at Austin and NBER, Daniel C. Waldinger, New York University and NBER

10:15 am Dynamic Matching with Post-allocation Service and its Application to Refugee Resettlement, Kirk C. Bansak, University of California, Berkeley, Soonbong Lee, Yale University, Vahideh Manshadi, Yale University, Rad Niazadeh, University of Chicago, Elisabeth Paulson, Harvard University

11:00 am  Break

11:30 am  Social Learning in Lung Transplant Decisions, Laura Doval, Columbia University, Federico Echenique, University of California, Berkeley, Wanying Huang, Monash University, Yi Xin, California Institute of Technology

12:15 pm  Endogenous Priority in Centralized Matching Markets: The Design of the Heart Transplant Waitlist, Kurt R. Sweat, Johns Hopkins University

1:00 pm Lunch

2:00 pm  Mechanism Reform: An Application to Child Welfare, E. Jason Baron, Duke University and NBER, Richard Lombardo, Harvard University, Joseph P. Ryan, University of Michigan, Jeongsoo Suh, Duke University, Quitze Valenzuela-Stookey, University of California, Berkeley

2:45 pm  The Competitive Core of Combinatorial Exchange, Simon Jantschgi, University of Oxford, Thanh T. Nguyen, Purdue University, Alexander Teytelboym, University of Oxford

3:30 pm  Break

4:00 pm  "Bid Shopping" in Procurement Auctions with Subcontracting(slides), Raymond Deneckere, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Daniel Quint, University of Wisconsin-Madison

4:45 pm Ads in Conversations: Market Thickness and Match Quality, Martino Banchio, Bocconi University, Aranyak Mehta, Google Research, Andres Perlroth, Google Research

5:30 pm Adjourn

7:00 pm  Group Dinner  Il Fornaio Palo Alto, 520 Cowper Street, Palo Alto, CA

Saturday, October 19

8:30 am Continental Breakfast

9:00 am Dynamic Auctions with Budget-Constrained Bidders: Evidence from the Online Advertising Market, Shunto J. Kobayashi, Boston University, Miguel Alcobendas, Yahoo Research

9:45 am The Welfare Effects of Sponsored Product Advertising, Chuan Yu, Harvard University

10:30 am Break

11:00 am An Empirical Analysis of the Interconnection Queue, Sarah Johnston, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Yifei Liu, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Chenyu Yang, University of Maryland

11:45 am  Iterative Network Pricing for Ridesharing Platforms Chenkai Yu, Columbia University, Hongyao Ma, Columbia University

12:30 pm  Lunch and Adjourn

New fellows of the Econometric Society

Congratulations to the 42 newly elected Fellows of the Econometric Society. That's up from 29 new Fellows elected in 2023, which is a step towards the goal (about which I blogged last year*) of electing more Fellows.  But elections depend on recognition that isn't equally available to every specialty and geography, so there are still many nominees and others who would be jewels in the crown of the Society.

"The Society is pleased to announce the election of 42 new Fellows of the Econometric Society. The 2024 Fellows of the Econometric Society follow.

Jerome Adda, Bocconi University 

Cristina Arellano, Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis (Secondary affiliation: Latin America)

Costas Arkolakis, Yale University

John Asker, University of California, Los Angeles (Secondary affiliation: Australasia)

David Atkin, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Paul Beaudry, University of British Columbia

Sascha O. Becker, University of Warwick and Monash University

Sandra E. Black, Columbia University

Estelle Cantillon, Universite Libre de Bruxelles

Alessandra Casella, Columbia University

Thomas Chaney, University of Southern California

David Dorn, University of Zurich

Janice Eberly, Northwestern University, Kellogg School of Management

Kfir Eliaz, Tel Aviv University

Erica Field, Duke University

Andrea Galeotti, London Business School

Francisco Gallego, Pontificia Universidad Caatolica de Chile

Maitreesh Ghatak, London School of Economics (Secondary affiliation: Asia)

Olivier Gossner, CNRS - CREST; London School of Economics

Ayşe Ökten İmrohoroğlu, University of Southern California

Henrik Kleven, Princeton University

Kala Krishna, The Pennsylvania State University

Jeanne Lafortune, Pontificia Universidad Catolica de Chile

Francesco Lippi, LUISS University; Einaudi Institute for Economics and Finance

Deborah J. Lucas, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Annamaria Lusardi, Stanford University

N. Gregory Mankiw, Harvard University

Kalina Manova, University College London

Elena Manresa, New York University

Enrique G. Mendoza, University of Pennsylvania (Secondary affiliation: Latin America)

Ismael Y. Mourifie, Washington University in St Louis (Secondary affiliation: Africa)

Barry Nalebuff, Yale School of Management

Andrew Newman, Boston University

Efe A. Ok, New York University

Guillermo Ordonez, University of Pennsylvania

Maria Petrova, Universitat Pompeu Fabra

Mar Reguant, IAE-CSIC; Northwestern University

Diego Restuccia, University of Toronto

Andrés Rodríguez-Clare, University of California, Berkeley (Secondary affiliation: Latin America)

Andrea Weber, Central European University

Luigi Zingales, University of Chicago Booth School of Business

Gabriel Zucman, Paris School of Economics; University of California, Berkeley

Finally, the Society would like to express its gratitude to the members of the 2024 Fellows Nominating Committee: Jan Eeckhout (chair), Mariacristina De Nardi, Marcela Eslava, Richard Holden, Yuichi Kitamura, Yaw Nyarko, and Nathan Nunn."

 

As I wrote last year, Congratulations again to the new Fellows, who have received the carefully considered and frugally awarded applause of their peers. 

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*Last year:

Tuesday, October 10, 2023

Econometric Society Fellows (2023), procedures, and some thoughts on prizes in general

Medical aid in dying comes up for a vote in England

 The upcoming vote on legalizing medical aid in dying in England and Wales has attracted controversy along lines that will be familiar to readers of this blog, concerning both fundamental values and slippery slopes.  But a comment by British Cardinal Vincent Nichols introduces an argument that I hadn't heard stated so clearly before, about the religious significance of suffering.  But first, here's the background, from the BMJ.

MPs set for historic vote on bill to legalise assisted dying in England and Wales,  by Clare Dyer, 07 October 2024  BMJ 2024;387:q2191

"A bill to legalise assisted dying for terminally ill people in England and Wales is expected to be introduced in the House of Commons on 16 October.

...

"Hundreds of terminally ill people from the UK have travelled to the Swiss clinic Dignitas to end their lives. But friends and relatives who help them are at risk of prosecution for assisting a suicide, which carries a maximum prison sentence of 14 years.

...

"Surveys of public opinion show that about two thirds of the public support allowing assisted dying. The BMA dropped its opposition in 2021 to take a neutral position on a change in the law."

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And here is a story about objections from a religious point of view, from the senior Catholic official in England.

UK’s top Catholic bishop urges faithful to lobby MPs to oppose assisted dying  by Hayden Vernon Sat 12 Oct 2024 

"The archbishop of Westminster continued: “The suffering of a human being is not meaningless. It does not destroy that dignity. It is an intrinsic part of our human journey, a journey embraced by the eternal word of God, Christ Jesus himself. He brings our humanity to its full glory precisely through the gateway of suffering and death.”

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Earlier:

Friday, March 1, 2024

Medical aid in dying--the ongoing debate in Britain

Nobel prize in economics to Daron Acemoglu, Simon Johnson, James A. Robinson

  "The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has decided to award the Sveriges Riksbank Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel 2024 to Daron Acemoglu, Simon Johnson, James A. Robinson “for studies of how institutions are formed and affect prosperity”

These three have a broad scope of work together.  One aspect that fits well with this year's prizes in Physics and Chemistry is a connection to artificial intelligence, particularly in the book Power and Progress by Acemoglu and Johnson:  

Power and Progress: Our Thousand-Year Struggle Over Technology and Prosperity  May 16, 2023 by Daron Acemoglu and Simon Johnson 

Here's the blurb by Abhijit Banerjee and Esther Duflo

"One powerful thread runs through this breathtaking tour of the history and future of technology, from the Neolithic agricultural revolution to the ascent of artificial intelligence: Technology is not destiny, nothing is pre-ordained. Humans, despite their imperfect institutions and often-contradictory impulses, remain in the driver’s seat. It is still our job to determine whether the vehicles we build are heading toward justice or down the cliff. In this age of relentless automation and seemingly unstoppable consolidation of power and wealth, Power and Progress is an essential reminder that we can, and must, take back control."

Stable matching in Scientific American

 Here's a short article in Scientific American, describing the deferred acceptance algorithm and mentioning some uses for stable matching. (When I was a child, Scientific American opened a window on science for me...)

The ‘Stable Marriage Problem’ Solution Underpins Dating Apps and School Admissions. An elegant matchmaking algorithm called Gale-Shapley can find the best possible pairings for everybody.   By Max Springer

"Let’s create a reality dating show unlike any other in one key aspect. First, we’ll rent a villa on a tropical island. Then we’ll fly in five men and five women, each with their own (heterosexual) dating preferences. Our goal, though, is the exact opposite of the Love Island franchise: we want absolutely zero drama. Can we ensure that everyone pairs off with a partner and sticks with them, without jealousy rearing its ugly head?" 

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Along the way they briefly quote these luminaries (in the order in which they appear): 

Vijay Vazirani, Jon Kleinberg, Utku Ünver, and Éva Tardos.

Kim Krawiec interview about WHO demands for national self sufficiency in blood donation and kidney exchange

 The University of Virginia takes note of the recent Krawiec & Roth paper I blogged about in August.

Here is their interview with Kim about the paper:

WHO Stifles International Blood and Organ Donations, Argue Professors. Professor Kimberly Krawiec, Nobel Prize Winner Alvin E. Roth of Stanford Argue World Health Organization Policies Need Revision

Here are the first two Q&As

"What motivated you to critique the WHO principles of self-sufficiency and nonremuneration in organs and blood? ​

"The severe shortage of both blood products and transplantable organs, especially kidneys, was our motivation and has motivated much of our other work, both together and separately. In the United States alone, the organ transplant waiting list is approximately 100,000 people, and if current trends continue, it will only grow in the coming years.

"Shortages of blood products present a similar challenge. Although wealthy countries are typically able to satisfy domestic whole blood needs, the vast majority of low- and middle-income countries (LMIC) are not. As a result, in many LMIC, shortages of blood for transfusion contribute to maternal death, death from traffic accidents and complications from childhood anemia. Moreover, even wealthy countries experience seasonal shortages of whole blood or deficiencies in some blood components, such as platelets, which are harder to collect and have a shorter shelf life.

The shortage of plasma-derived medicinal products (PDMPs) is particularly severe and entirely preventable. PDMPs are life-saving treatments for multiple acute and chronic conditions for which there are no alternative treatments. Yet these life-saving therapies are unavailable to much of the world’s population. The United States, one of the few countries to pay plasma donors, supplies 70% of the world’s plasma needs, with Germany, Austria, Hungary, Czechia and Latvia (which also permit some form of payment for plasma donors) supplying another 20% of the world total. In other words, a handful of countries supply plasma to the rest of the world, including other wealthy countries. Meanwhile, LMIC who can neither collect and process their own nor afford to purchase blood products on the open market (or are prevented from doing so under the terms of the foreign aid that supports their health system) simply do without, to the detriment of their citizens.

"How do current WHO policies on organ and blood donation contribute to this problem?

"WHO policy mandates both national (or sometimes only regional) self-sufficiency and an absence of remuneration for both blood products and transplantable organs — what we refer to in the paper as “the twin principles.” These twin principles are unhelpful separately and unworkable together. Their effect on blood products is particularly stark — no country that fails to compensate donors is self-sufficient in plasma collection and few LMIC collect sufficient supplies of whole blood.

"The self-sufficiency mandate presents a real hurdle to progress in transplantation, especially for smaller countries and LMIC. This is especially the case because some of the most exciting and promising developments for increasing the availability of transplants have been in kidney exchange, a mechanism that leverages in-kind exchange, rather than financial compensation, to encourage and facilitate donation among those with willing but incompatible partners. But kidney exchange works best when a large pool of patient-donor pairs can engage with one another. So, requiring that transplantation be contained within national boundaries unnecessarily limits access to transplants that could be achieved only by cross-border exchange."

Medical Aid in Dying Laws in the U.S.

 JAMA has a review of the current state of medical aid in dying in the 12 U.S. jurisdictions (if Delaware proceeds) that now allow it.

Medical Aid in Dying Laws: More Accessible in More States by Thaddeus Mason Pope, JD, PhD, JAMA. 2024;332(14):1139-1140. doi:10.1001/jama.2024.15925

"Delaware may soon become the 12th US jurisdiction to authorize medical aid in dying. The Ron Silverio/Heather Block End-of-Life Options Law1 becomes a statute as soon as the governor acts and takes effect once the Delaware Department of Health and Social Services promulgates regulations to implement the statute. Delaware could follow 11 other US jurisdictions that have authorized medical aid in dying; more than 15 000 patients have received prescriptions for medical aid in dying since 1998 in California, Colorado, Hawaiʻi, Maine, Montana, New Jersey, New Mexico, Oregon, Vermont, Washington, and Washington, DC.

...

"Medical aid in dying has become an increasingly prominent end-of-life option. More than 20 states considered new medical aid in dying legislation in 2024, and most of the 11 jurisdictions that previously authorized medical aid in dying have amended their original statutes during the past 5 years (eTable in the Supplement).2-6 When enacting or amending medical aid in dying statutes, state policymakers have been carefully recalibrating the balance between safety and access

...

"Medical aid in dying is only available to terminally ill adults with decision-making capacity. They must have an “incurable and irreversible illness” with a prognosis of 6 months or less. If patients can navigate the other eligibility requirements and safeguards, they can get a prescription for lethal medications that they might later self-ingest to hasten their death.6

"Hospice and palliative care are often sufficient to address the suffering of patients, and one-third of those who receive medical aid in dying prescriptions never obtain them from the pharmacy or ingest them.3,4 Most of the remaining patients administer the prescriptions by mixing the powdered drugs with 2 oz to 3 oz of apple juice or push a plunger on a feeding or rectal tube. The patients fall asleep within minutes and usually die within an hour. There is never intravenous administration of the prescriptions or clinician- or third-party administration of the prescriptions.

...

"The Delaware end-of-life options law would require the patient to make 3 requests, 2 of which must be separated by at least 15 days.1 A waiting period has been a requirement in all jurisdictions that have authorized medical aid in dying. However, significant evidence showed that many patients either died or lost decision-making capacity before expiration of the waiting period.4 Many states (California, Colorado, Hawaiʻi, New Mexico, Oregon, and Washington) have either shortened their waiting periods or permit the waiting period to be waived when the patient is likely to die or lose decision-making capacity.

"The Delaware end-of-life options law would be limited to residents of Delaware1; however, for nonresidents, Delaware residency can be established by renting an apartment in Delaware.4 Residency requirements remain an additional hurdle in a long list of obstacles that terminally ill patients must navigate to become eligible. Within the past 2 years, both Oregon and Vermont removed their residency requirements.2,4,6 And the constitutionality of New Jersey’s residency requirement is being challenged in federal court.6 Nationwide, many bills proposed in 2024 omitted residency preconditions.

...

"Commentators regularly express concerns about the use of medical aid in dying in Canada7 and in Europe. It is important to protect vulnerable populations from coercion, duress, and inadequately considered choices; patients should not be steered toward choosing to request medical aid in dying. In addition, the adverse effects of orally ingested medications must be mitigated.4 In California, SB 1196 would have probably solved that problem by permitting (self-administered) intravenous administration of the end-of-life prescriptions. However, any change that would allow intravenous administration and other new and imminent expansions for medical aid in dying raise their own set of novel challenges for US clinicians.

"Given the number of bills and other indicators of interest, medical aid in dying is likely to be authorized in more states over the next few years, and the use medical aid in dying is likely to increase with more accessible terms and conditions. Although medical aid in dying continues to be used by less than 1% of dying patients,2 it is becoming a more integral part of end-of-life care."