arXiv subjects

Varun Bansal

Publications and source records attributed to Varun Bansal.

3 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Stable Matching with Choice Correspondences: Beyond Path Independence

We study stable matching with agents' choice correspondences as primitives. For many-to-many markets we introduce Individually Rational Persistence (IRP), which admits status-quo persistence, and show that substitutability (SUB) and IRP guarantee a stable matching; the constructive proof yields a symmetric matching algorithm with no proposing side and long-term contracts. For one-to-one markets we introduce replacement-based stability and show that SUB together with binary acyclicity (BA) guarantees existence. Combining the two, in the many-to-one setting, where SUB and irrelevance of rejected contracts (IRC) guarantee stability, we show that SUB with IRP on firms and BA on workers guarantees existence. We show that, in the presence of SUB, IRC is not necessary for existence in any of the three models, so stable matchings exist outside the domain of path independence.

econ.TH↗

arXiv2024

Random Attention and Unobserved Reference Alternatives

In this paper, I develop and characterize two models of random attention that differ from each other with respect to the menu-dependence of the unobserved reference alternatives. In both models, the decision-maker pays attention to subsets of the available set of alternatives randomly with the reference alternatives being always paid attention to. Under menu-dependence, partial identification of both the reference alternatives and the underlying preferences is provided. For the case of multiple menu-independent references, I provide a complete identification of the references and a coarse identification of the underlying preferences. A complete identification of the latter is provided when the independent random attention function is considered.

econ.TH↗

arXiv2020

How India Censors the Web

One of the primary ways in which India engages in online censorship is by ordering Internet Service Providers (ISPs) operating in its jurisdiction to block access to certain websites for its users. This paper reports the different techniques Indian ISPs are using to censor websites, and investigates whether website blocklists are consistent across ISPs. We propose a suite of tests that prove more robust than previous work in detecting DNS and HTTP based censorship. Our tests also discern the use of SNI inspection for blocking websites, which is previously undocumented in the Indian context. Using information from court orders, user reports, and public and leaked government orders, we compile the largest known list of potentially blocked websites in India. We pass this list to our tests and run them from connections of six different ISPs, which together serve more than 98% of Internet users in India. Our findings not only confirm that ISPs are using different techniques to block websites, but also demonstrate that different ISPs are not blocking the same websites.

cs.NI↗