Market Design with Financially Constrained Agents

许多重要的资源，如住房、医疗保健、人体器官和教育，往往通过与“经典”市场不同的方式进行分配。目前的项目为使用这种非市场方法提供了一个效率基础，并研究了改进这些方法的方法，特别关注公立学校选择计划。当前研究的关键因素是认识到，由于个人进入资本市场的机会不平等，他们往往在财务上受到限制，有些人比其他人更受限制。个人面临的这种财务约束的不平等导致标准市场对富人的分配存在偏见，使结果变得低效，而且不仅是不公平，即使与简单的随机分配资源相比，只要资源的接受者被允许转售它们。允许福利或应享权利的接受者转让这些福利或应享权利对于有效地分配资源的非市场方法是至关重要的，但这项研究也查明无限制的可转让在产生投机活动方面的成本。在为资源配置的非市场方法建立了一般效率基础之后，本研究接着探讨了改进现有方法的方法，特别是那些在公立学校选择计划中采用的方法。特别是，该项目提出了一个新的程序，允许参与者表明他们的偏好，但以一种限制他们“博弈系统”的动机的方式。研究表明，这种新的择校程序比现有的择校程序更有效。接下来，该项目通过实验测试了与新程序相关的效率效益，以及参与程序的个人可获得的信息的作用。最后，该项目调查了住房市场在传统的以住宅为基础的制度和新的择校制度中所扮演的角色。更广泛的影响：许多正在调查的问题具有重要的政策含义。第一部分发现了与允许福利或权利接受者转移福利或权利相关的权衡。这一发现可以广泛应用于许多政府项目，尤其是那些目前不允许此类转移的项目，包括移民签证和获取人体器官。第二部分关于择校设计有更直接、更具体的应用。拟议的程序有可能比迄今为止使用或提议的方法更有效地分配学生到学校，并可能影响全国许多地区择校计划的设计方式。最后，这个项目有望更好地理解住房市场在学校选择中的作用，尤其是所谓的“步行区”优先权的优点，这通常是授予居住在学校附近的学生，以有利于他们被分配到该学校。

Many important resources, such as housing, health care, human organs, and education, are often allocated via methods that depart from "classic" markets. The current project provides an efficiency foundation for the use of such non-market methods and investigates ways to improve upon them, with a special attention given to the public school choice programs. The key element of the current research is the recognition that individuals are often financially constrained, some more so than others, due to their unequal access to capital markets. This inequality in financial constraints facing individuals causes standard markets to be prejudiced in allocation toward wealthy individuals, making the outcome inefficient, and not just inequitable, even compared with simple random assignment of resources, provided that the recipients of the resources are allowed to resell them. Allowing the recipients of benefits or entitlements to transfer them is crucial for non-market methods of resource allocation to be efficient, but this research also identifies the cost associated with unrestricted transferability in engendering speculation activities. Having established a general efficiency foundation for non-market methods of resource allocation, the research then investigates ways to improve upon existing methods, particularly those adopted in public school choice programs. In particular, the project proposes a new procedure which would allow participants to signal their preferences, but in a way that limits their incentives to "game the system." The research demonstrates this new procedure of school choice to be more efficient than the existing procedures. The project next tests experimentally the efficiency benefit associated with the new procedure as well as the role of information available to the individuals participating in the program. Finally, the project investigates the roles housing markets play in the traditional residence-based regime as well as in the new school choice regime. Broader Impact: Many issues under investigation have significant policy implications. The first part finds a tradeoff associated with allowing recipients of benefits or entitlements to transfer them. This finding has broad applications for many government programs, especially those which currently do not permit such transfers, including assignment of immigration visas and access to human organs. The second part on school choice design has more immediate and tangible applications. The proposed procedure has a potential for assigning students to schools more efficiently than the methods that have been used or proposed thus far and may influence the way school choice programs are designed in many parts of the country. Lastly, this project promises to yield a better understanding about the role of housing market in school selection in general, but particularly about the merit of the so-called "walk zone'' priority, which is often awarded to the students who reside in the immediate vicinity of a school to favor their assignment to that school.