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The modified Boston mechanism

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  • Dur, Umut Mert

Abstract

Many school districts in the U.S. assign students to schools via the Boston mechanism. The Boston mechanism is not strategy-proof, and it is easy to manipulate. We slightly modify the Boston mechanism and show that the modified version outperforms the Boston mechanism in terms of strategy-proofness. In particular, the Boston mechanism is manipulable whenever the modified version is, but the modified version is not necessarily manipulable whenever the Boston mechanism is. We define a weaker form of consistency and characterize the modified Boston mechanism by this weaker form and a new axiom called respect of priority of the top-ranking students.

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  • Dur, Umut Mert, 2019. "The modified Boston mechanism," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 101(C), pages 31-40.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:matsoc:v:101:y:2019:i:c:p:31-40
    DOI: 10.1016/j.mathsocsci.2018.08.004
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Jorge Alcalde-Unzu & Flip Klijn & Marc Vorsatz, 2023. "Constrained school choice: an experimental QRE analysis," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 61(3), pages 587-624, October.
    2. Decerf, Benoit & Van der Linden, Martin, 2021. "Manipulability in school choice," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 197(C).
    3. Jaramillo, Paula & Kayı, Çaǧatay & Klijn, Flip, 2021. "School choice: Nash implementation of stable matchings through rank-priority mechanisms," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 95(C).
    4. Atila Abdulkadiroglu & Tommy Andersson, 2022. "School Choice," NBER Working Papers 29822, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Christian Basteck & Marco Mantovani, 2023. "Aiding applicants: leveling the playing field within the immediate acceptance mechanism," Review of Economic Design, Springer;Society for Economic Design, vol. 27(1), pages 187-220, February.
    6. Rasoul Ramezanian & Mehdi Feizi, 2021. "Ex-post favoring ranks: a fairness notion for the random assignment problem," Review of Economic Design, Springer;Society for Economic Design, vol. 25(3), pages 157-176, September.
    7. Rustamdjan Hakimov & Madhav Raghavan, 2023. "Improving Transparency and Verifiability in School Admissions: Theory and Experiment," Rationality and Competition Discussion Paper Series 376, CRC TRR 190 Rationality and Competition.
    8. Akyol, Ethem, 2023. "Inefficiency of Random Serial Dictatorship under incomplete information," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 213(C).
    9. Bonkoungou, Somouaoga & Nesterov, Alexander, 2023. "Incentives in matching markets: counting and comparing manipulating agents," Theoretical Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 18(3), July.
    10. Mennle, Timo & Seuken, Sven, 2021. "Partial strategyproofness: Relaxing strategyproofness for the random assignment problem," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 191(C).
    11. Lomakin, Artemii & Minibaev, Kamil & Nesterov, Alexander, 2024. "Modifications of Boston, Taiwanese and Chinese mechanisms are not comparable via counting manipulating students," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 237(C).
    12. Yuanju Fang, 2021. "School Choice in Guangzhou: Why High-Scoring Students Are Protected?," Games, MDPI, vol. 12(2), pages 1-12, April.

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