arXiv subjects

A. Arda Gitmez

Publications and source records attributed to A. Arda Gitmez.

3 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2023

Improving the Deferred Acceptance with Minimal Compromise

In school choice problems, the motivation for students' welfare (efficiency) is restrained by concerns to respect schools' priorities (fairness). Among the fair matchings, even the best one in terms of welfare (SOSM) is inefficient. Moreover, any mechanism that improves welfare over the SOSM is manipulable by the students. First, we characterize the "least manipulable" mechanisms in this class: monotonically-promoting transformation proofness ensures that no student is better off by promoting their assigned school under the true preferences. Second, we use the notion that a matching is less unfair if it yields a smaller set of students whose priorities are violated, and define minimal unfairness accordingly. We then show that the Efficiency Adjusted Deferred Acceptance (EADA) mechanism is minimally unfair in the class of efficient and monotonically-promoting transformation proof mechanisms. When the objective is to improve students' welfare over the SOSM, this characterization implies an important insight into the frontier of the main axioms in school choice.

econ.TH↗

arXiv2023

Informational Autocrats, Diverse Societies

This paper presents a theoretical model of an autocrat who controls the media in an attempt to persuade society of his competence. We base our analysis on a Bayesian persuasion framework in which citizens have heterogeneous preferences and beliefs about the autocrat. We characterize the autocrat's information manipulation strategy when society is monolithic and when it is divided. When the preferences and beliefs in society are more diverse, the autocrat engages in less information manipulation. Our findings thus suggest that the diversity of attitudes and opinions can act as a bulwark against information manipulation by hostile actors.

econ.TH↗

arXiv2022

Proximity, Similarity, and Friendship Formation: Theory and Evidence

Can proximity make friendships more diverse? To address this question, we propose a learning-driven friendship formation model to study how proximity and similarity influence the likelihood of forming social connections. The model predicts that proximity affects more friendships between dissimilar than similar individuals, in opposition to a preference-driven version of the model. We use an experiment at selective boarding schools in Peru that generates random variation in the physical proximity between students to test these predictions. The empirical evidence is consistent with the learning model: while social networks exhibit homophily by academic achievement and poverty, proximity generates more diverse social connections.

econ.GN↗