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Top Trading with Fixed Tie-Breaking in Markets with Indivisible Goods

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  • EHLERS, Lars

Abstract

We study markets with indivisible goods where monetary compensations are not possible. Each individual is endowed with an object and a preference relation over all objects. When preferences are strict, Gale's top trading cycle algorithm finds the unique core allocation. When preferences are not necessarily strict, we use an exogenous profile of tie-breakers to resolve any ties in individuals' preferences and apply Gale's top trading cycle algorithm for the resulting profile of strict preferences. We provide a foundation of these simple extensions of Gale's top trading cycle algorithm from strict preferences to weak preferences. We show that Gale's top trading cycle algorithm with fixed tie-breaking is characterized by individual rationality, strategy-proofness, weak efficiency, non-bossiness, and consistency. Our result supports the common practice in applications to break ties in weak preferences using some fixed exogenous criteria and then to use a “good and simple” rule for the resulting strict preferences. This reinforces the market-based approach even in the presence of indifferences because always competitive allocations are chosen.

Suggested Citation

  • EHLERS, Lars, 2012. "Top Trading with Fixed Tie-Breaking in Markets with Indivisible Goods," Cahiers de recherche 2012-02, Universite de Montreal, Departement de sciences economiques.
    • Handle: RePEc:mtl:montde:2012-02
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    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/1866/8258
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    Cited by:

    1. William Thomson, 2016. "Non-bossiness," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 47(3), pages 665-696, October.
    2. Tommy Andersson & Lars Ehlers & Lars-Gunnar Svensson & Ryan Tierney, 2022. "Gale’s Fixed Tax for Exchanging Houses," Mathematics of Operations Research, INFORMS, vol. 47(4), pages 3110-3128, November.
    3. Karakaya, Mehmet & Klaus, Bettina & Schlegel, Jan Christoph, 2019. "Top trading cycles, consistency, and acyclic priorities for house allocation with existing tenants," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 184(C).
    4. Ivan Balbuzanov & Maciej H. Kotowski, 2019. "Endowments, Exclusion, and Exchange," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 87(5), pages 1663-1692, September.
    5. Ata Atay & Ana Mauleon & Vincent Vannetelbosch, 2022. "Limited Farsightedness in Priority-Based Matching," Papers 2212.07427, arXiv.org.
    6. Fujinaka, Yuji & Miyakawa, Toshiji, 2020. "Ex-post incentive compatible and individually rational assignments in housing markets with interdependent values," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 91(C), pages 157-164.
    7. Ahmad, Ghufran, 2021. "Group incentive compatibility in the housing market problem with weak preferences," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 126(C), pages 136-162.
    8. Atila Abdulkadiroglu & Tommy Andersson, 2022. "School Choice," NBER Working Papers 29822, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    9. Xinsheng Xiong & Xianjia Wang & Kun He, 2022. "A new allocation rule for the housing market problem with ties," Journal of Combinatorial Optimization, Springer, vol. 43(1), pages 98-115, January.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Indivisible goods; top trading cycles; indifferences; fixed tie-breaking.;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C78 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Bargaining Theory; Matching Theory
    • D63 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - Equity, Justice, Inequality, and Other Normative Criteria and Measurement
    • D70 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - General

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