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Twisting the truth: Foundations of wishful thinking

Kovach, Matthew - In: Theoretical Economics 15 (2020) 3, pp. 989-1022

Considerable evidence shows that people have optimistic beliefs about future outcomes. I present an axiomatic model of wishful thinking (WT), in which an endowed alternative, or status quo, influences the agent's beliefs over states and thus induces such optimism. I introduce a behavioral axiom...

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10013188993

Monotone threshold representations

Frick, Mira - In: Theoretical Economics 11 (2016) 3, pp. 757-772

utility function $v$, from which the agent's choices depart in a menu-dependent manner. The severity of the departure is …

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10011599584

Malthusian stagnation is efficient

Córdoba Muñoz, Juan C.; Liu, Xiying - In: Theoretical Economics 17 (2022) 1, pp. 415-460

This article studies socially optimal allocations, from the point of view of a benevolent social planner, in environments characterized by fixed resources, endogenous fertility, and full information. Individuals in our environment are fully rational and altruistic toward their descendants. Our...

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10013189017

Who's afraid of aggregating money metrics?

Bosmans, Kristof; Decancq, Koen; Ooghe, Erwin - In: Theoretical Economics 13 (2018) 2, pp. 467-484

We provide an axiomatic justification to aggregate money metrics. The key axiom requires the approval of richer-to-poorer transfers that preserve the overall efficiency of the distribution. This transfer principle - together with the basic axioms of anonymity, continuity, monotonicity, and a...

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10012010032

Information, evolution and utility

Swinkels, Jeroen M.; Samuelson, Larry - In: Theoretical Economics 1 (2006) 1, pp. 119-142

Human utility embodies a number of seemingly irrational aspects. The leading example in this paper is that utilities … of our utility functions. …

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10011599367

Information, evolution and utility

Swinkels, Jeroen M.; Samuelson, Larry - In: Theoretical Economics 1 (2006) 1, pp. 119-142

Human utility embodies a number of seemingly irrational aspects. The leading example in this paper is that utilities … of our utility functions. …

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005212485

Games with switching costs and endogenous references

Guney, Begum; Richter, Michael - In: Theoretical Economics 17 (2022) 2, pp. 617-650

We introduce a game-theoretic model with switching costs and endogenous references. An agent endogenizes his reference strategy and then, taking switching costs into account, he selects a strategy from which there is no profitable deviation. We axiomatically characterize this selection procedure...

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10014536971

Can intergenerational equity be operationalized?

Zame, William R. - In: Theoretical Economics 2 (2007) 2, pp. 187-202

be born. The literature formalizes this ideal as asking for a preference relation on the space of infinite utility … preference relation has the property that almost all (in the sense of outer measure) pairs of utility streams are indifferent … invariant to finite permutations has the property that almost all pairs of utility streams are incomparable (not strictly ranked …

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10011599387

Can intergenerational equity be operationalized?

Zame, William R. - In: Theoretical Economics 2 (2007) 2

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005515739

Rationalizable voting

Kalandrakis, Tasos - In: Theoretical Economics 5 (2010) 1, pp. 93-125

admit a (quasi)concave utility representation? I derive necessary and sufficient conditions and a tractable algorithm to … verify their validity. I show that the hypothesis that the voter has preferences represented by a concave utility function is … observationally equivalent to the hypothesis that she has preferences represented by a quasiconcave utility function, I obtain …

Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10011599425