[go: up one dir, main page]
IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/hal/journl/halshs-01224145.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Harsanyi's theorem without the sure-thing principle: On the consistent aggregation of Monotonic Bernoullian and Archimedean preferences

Author

Listed:
  • Stéphane Zuber

    (CES - Centre d'économie de la Sorbonne - UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, PSE - Paris School of Economics - UP1 - Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne - ENS-PSL - École normale supérieure - Paris - PSL - Université Paris Sciences et Lettres - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - ENPC - École des Ponts ParisTech - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique - INRAE - Institut National de Recherche pour l’Agriculture, l’Alimentation et l’Environnement)

Abstract
This paper studies the extension of Harsanyi's theorem (Harsanyi, 1995) in a framework involving uncertainty. It seeks to extend the aggregation result to a wide class of Monotonic Bernoullian and Archimedean preferences (Cerreia-Vioglio et al., 2011) that subsumes many models of choice under uncertainty proposed in the literature. An impossibility result is obtained, unless we are in the specific framework where all individuals and the decision-maker are subjective expected utility maximizers sharing the same beliefs. This implies that non-expected utility preferences cannot be aggregated consistently.

Suggested Citation

  • Stéphane Zuber, 2015. "Harsanyi's theorem without the sure-thing principle: On the consistent aggregation of Monotonic Bernoullian and Archimedean preferences," Post-Print halshs-01224145, HAL.
    • Handle: RePEc:hal:journl:halshs-01224145
    Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://shs.hal.science/halshs-01224145
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://shs.hal.science/halshs-01224145/document
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Blackorby, Charles & Donaldson, David & Weymark, John A., 1999. "Harsanyi's social aggregation theorem for state-contingent alternatives1," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 32(3), pages 365-387, November.
    2. Markus K. Brunnermeier & Alp Simsek & Wei Xiong, 2014. "A Welfare Criterion For Models With Distorted Beliefs," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 129(4), pages 1753-1797.
    3. Fleurbaey, Marc, 2009. "Two variants of Harsanyi's aggregation theorem," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 105(3), pages 300-302, December.
    4. Marc Fleurbaey, 2010. "Assessing Risky Social Situations," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 118(4), pages 649-680, August.
    5. Mongin, Philippe & Pivato, Marcus, 2015. "Ranking multidimensional alternatives and uncertain prospects," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 157(C), pages 146-171.
    6. Epstein, Larry G & Segal, Uzi, 1992. "Quadratic Social Welfare Functions," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 100(4), pages 691-712, August.
    7. Peter A. Diamond, 1967. "Cardinal Welfare, Individualistic Ethics, and Interpersonal Comparison of Utility: Comment," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 75(5), pages 765-765.
    8. Mongin, Philippe, 1998. "The paradox of the Bayesian experts and state-dependent utility theory," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 29(3), pages 331-361, April.
    9. Hervé Crès & Itzhak Gilboa & Nicolas Vieille, 2011. "Aggregation of multiple prior opinions," Post-Print hal-00656618, HAL.
    10. Hill , Brian & Danan , Eric, 2014. "Aggregating Tastes, Beliefs, and Attitudes Under Uncertainty," HEC Research Papers Series 1057, HEC Paris.
    11. Gajdos, T. & Tallon, J.-M. & Vergnaud, J.-C., 2008. "Representation and aggregation of preferences under uncertainty," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 141(1), pages 68-99, July.
    12. Machina, Mark J, 1989. "Dynamic Consistency and Non-expected Utility Models of Choice under Uncertainty," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 27(4), pages 1622-1668, December.
    13. repec:hal:pseose:halshs-01415412 is not listed on IDEAS
    14. Christopher P. Chambers & Takashi Hayashi, 2014. "Preference Aggregation With Incomplete Information," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 82(2), pages 589-599, March.
    15. Eric Danan & Thibault Gajdos & Brian Hill & Jean-Marc Tallon, 2016. "Robust Social Decisions," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 106(9), pages 2407-2425, September.
    16. Itzhak Gilboa & Dov Samet & David Schmeidler, 2004. "Utilitarian Aggregation of Beliefs and Tastes," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 112(4), pages 932-938, August.
    17. Charles Blackorby & David Donaldson & Philippe Mongin, 2004. "Social Aggregation Without the Expected Utility Hypothesis," Working Papers hal-00242932, HAL.
    18. Itzhak Gilboa & Larry Samuelson & David Schmeidler, 2014. "No‐Betting‐Pareto Dominance," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 82(4), pages 1405-1442, July.
    19. Antoine Bommier & Stéphane Zuber, 2012. "The Pareto Principle Of Optimal Inequality," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 53(2), pages 593-608, May.
    20. Crès, Hervé & Gilboa, Itzhak & Vieille, Nicolas, 2011. "Aggregation of multiple prior opinions," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 146(6), pages 2563-2582.
    21. Gilboa, Itzhak & Schmeidler, David, 1989. "Maxmin expected utility with non-unique prior," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 18(2), pages 141-153, April.
    22. John C. Harsanyi, 1955. "Cardinal Welfare, Individualistic Ethics, and Interpersonal Comparisons of Utility," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 63(4), pages 309-309.
    23. Ergin, Haluk & Gul, Faruk, 2009. "A theory of subjective compound lotteries," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 144(3), pages 899-929, May.
    24. Peter Klibanoff & Massimo Marinacci & Sujoy Mukerji, 2005. "A Smooth Model of Decision Making under Ambiguity," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 73(6), pages 1849-1892, November.
    25. Eric Danan & Thibault Gajdos & Brian Hill & Jean-Marc Tallon, 2016. "Robust Social Decisions," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 106(9), pages 2407-2425, September.
    26. Fabio Maccheroni & Massimo Marinacci & Aldo Rustichini, 2006. "Ambiguity Aversion, Robustness, and the Variational Representation of Preferences," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 74(6), pages 1447-1498, November.
    27. Chambers, Christopher P. & Hayashi, Takashi, 2006. "Preference aggregation under uncertainty: Savage vs. Pareto," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 54(2), pages 430-440, February.
    28. Chateauneuf, Alain & Wakker, Peter, 1993. "From local to global additive representation," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 22(6), pages 523-545.
    29. repec:hal:wpspec:info:hdl:2441/eu4vqp9ompqllr09iepso50rh is not listed on IDEAS
    30. Mongin Philippe, 1995. "Consistent Bayesian Aggregation," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 66(2), pages 313-351, August.
    31. Myerson, Roger B, 1981. "Utilitarianism, Egalitarianism, and the Timing Effect in Social Choice Problems," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 49(4), pages 883-897, June.
    32. Simone Cerreia-Vioglio & Paolo Ghirardato & Fabio Maccheroni & Massimo Marinacci & Marciano Siniscalchi, 2011. "Rational preferences under ambiguity," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 48(2), pages 341-375, October.
    33. Schmeidler, David, 1989. "Subjective Probability and Expected Utility without Additivity," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 57(3), pages 571-587, May.
    34. Herzberg, Frederik, 2014. "Aggregation of Monotonic Bernoullian Archimedean preferences: Arrovian impossibility results," Center for Mathematical Economics Working Papers 488, Center for Mathematical Economics, Bielefeld University.
    35. Hylland, Aanund & Zeckhauser, Richard J, 1979. "The Impossibility of Bayesian Group Decision Making with Separate Aggregation of Beliefs and Values," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 47(6), pages 1321-1336, November.
    36. repec:bla:econom:v:48:y:1981:i:191:p:235-50 is not listed on IDEAS
    37. repec:hal:spmain:info:hdl:2441/eu4vqp9ompqllr09iepso50rh is not listed on IDEAS
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. McCarthy, David & Mikkola, Kalle & Thomas, Teruji, 2020. "Utilitarianism with and without expected utility," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(C), pages 77-113.
    2. Takashi Hayashi & Michele Lombardi, 2019. "Fair social decision under uncertainty and belief disagreements," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 67(4), pages 775-816, June.
    3. Eric Danan & Thibault Gajdos & Brian Hill & Jean-Marc Tallon, 2016. "Robust Social Decisions," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 106(9), pages 2407-2425, September.
    4. Dean Spears & Stéphane Zuber, 2023. "Foundations of utilitarianism under risk and variable population," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 61(1), pages 101-129, July.
    5. Dietrich, Franz, 2021. "Fully Bayesian aggregation," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 194(C).
    6. David McCarthy & Kalle Mikkola & Teruji Thomas, 2019. "Aggregation for potentially infinite populations without continuity or completeness," Papers 1911.00872, arXiv.org.
    7. Gustafsson, Johan E. & Spears, Dean & Zuber, Stéphane, 2023. "Utilitarianism Is Implied by Social and Individual Dominance," IZA Discussion Papers 16561, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    8. repec:hal:pseose:halshs-01415412 is not listed on IDEAS
    9. Takashi Hayashi, 2021. "Collective decision under ignorance," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 57(2), pages 347-359, August.
    10. Bach Dong-Xuan, 2024. "Aggregation of misspecified experts," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 78(3), pages 923-943, November.
    11. Takashi Hayashi, 2019. "What Should Society Maximise Under Uncertainty?," The Japanese Economic Review, Springer, vol. 70(4), pages 446-478, December.
    12. Franz Dietrich, 2020. "The Rational Group," Université Paris1 Panthéon-Sorbonne (Post-Print and Working Papers) halshs-02431868, HAL.
    13. Mark Schneider, 2018. "A Dual System Model of Risk and Time Preferences," Working Papers 18-18, Chapman University, Economic Science Institute.
    14. McCarthy, David & Mikkola, Kalle & Thomas, Teruji, 2016. "Utilitarianism with and without expected utility," MPRA Paper 72578, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    15. Marc Fleurbaey, 2018. "Welfare economics, risk and uncertainty," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 51(1), pages 5-40, February.
    16. Eric Danan, 2021. "Partial utilitarianism," Working Papers hal-03327900, HAL.
    17. Mark Schneider, 2016. "Dual Process Utility Theory: A Model of Decisions Under Risk and Over Time," Working Papers 16-23, Chapman University, Economic Science Institute.
    18. Pivato, Marcus, 2022. "Bayesian social aggregation with accumulating evidence," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 200(C).
    19. Miyagishima, Kaname, 2019. "Fair criteria for social decisions under uncertainty," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 80(C), pages 77-87.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. McCarthy, David & Mikkola, Kalle & Thomas, Teruji, 2020. "Utilitarianism with and without expected utility," Journal of Mathematical Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(C), pages 77-113.
    2. Takashi Hayashi & Michele Lombardi, 2019. "Fair social decision under uncertainty and belief disagreements," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 67(4), pages 775-816, June.
    3. Fleurbaey, Marc & Zuber, Stéphane, 2017. "Fair management of social risk," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 169(C), pages 666-706.
    4. McCarthy, David & Mikkola, Kalle & Thomas, Teruji, 2016. "Utilitarianism with and without expected utility," MPRA Paper 72578, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. Philippe Mongin & Marcus Pivato, 2020. "Social preference under twofold uncertainty," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 70(3), pages 633-663, October.
    6. Eric Danan & Thibault Gajdos & Brian Hill & Jean-Marc Tallon, 2016. "Robust Social Decisions," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 106(9), pages 2407-2425, September.
    7. Stanca, Lorenzo, 2021. "Smooth aggregation of Bayesian experts," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 196(C).
    8. Marc Fleurbaey, 2018. "Welfare economics, risk and uncertainty," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 51(1), pages 5-40, February.
    9. repec:hal:pseose:halshs-01415412 is not listed on IDEAS
    10. Federica Ceron & Vassili Vergopoulos, 2017. "Aggregation of Bayesian preferences: Unanimity vs Monotonicity," Post-Print halshs-01539444, HAL.
    11. Federica Ceron & Vassili Vergopoulos, 2017. "Aggregation of Bayesian preferences: Unanimity vs Monotonicity," Université Paris1 Panthéon-Sorbonne (Post-Print and Working Papers) halshs-01539444, HAL.
    12. Federica Ceron & Vassili Vergopoulos, 2017. "Aggregation of Bayesian preferences: Unanimity vs Monotonicity," Documents de travail du Centre d'Economie de la Sorbonne 17028, Université Panthéon-Sorbonne (Paris 1), Centre d'Economie de la Sorbonne.
    13. Federica Ceron & Vassili Vergopoulos, 2019. "Aggregation of Bayesian preferences: unanimity vs monotonicity," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 52(3), pages 419-451, March.
    14. Hill , Brian & Danan , Eric, 2014. "Aggregating Tastes, Beliefs, and Attitudes Under Uncertainty," HEC Research Papers Series 1057, HEC Paris.
    15. Mongin, Philippe & Pivato, Marcus, 2015. "Ranking multidimensional alternatives and uncertain prospects," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 157(C), pages 146-171.
    16. Dietrich, Franz, 2021. "Fully Bayesian aggregation," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 194(C).
    17. Brandl, Florian, 2021. "Belief-averaging and relative utilitarianism," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 198(C).
    18. Takashi Hayashi, 2019. "What Should Society Maximise Under Uncertainty?," The Japanese Economic Review, Springer, vol. 70(4), pages 446-478, December.
    19. ,, 2012. "The ex-ante aggregation of opinions under uncertainty," Theoretical Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 7(3), September.
    20. Pivato, Marcus, 2022. "Bayesian social aggregation with accumulating evidence," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 200(C).
    21. Gajdos, T. & Tallon, J.-M. & Vergnaud, J.-C., 2008. "Representation and aggregation of preferences under uncertainty," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 141(1), pages 68-99, July.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Harsanyi's theorem; Pareto principle; Monotonic Bernoullian and Archimedean preferences; Subjective expected utility;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D71 - Microeconomics - - Analysis of Collective Decision-Making - - - Social Choice; Clubs; Committees; Associations
    • D81 - Microeconomics - - Information, Knowledge, and Uncertainty - - - Criteria for Decision-Making under Risk and Uncertainty

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:hal:journl:halshs-01224145. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: CCSD (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.