Friday, November 20, 2015

Matchmaking among the Haredi

Ynet has a story: 
Ultra-orthodox matchmaking: everything it's best not to know

"Among the traditional Haredi public – not the modern stream, which has changed in recent years – pairing one's children is the exclusive responsibility of parents. No yeshiva boy is supposed to choose a girl himself. When parents think the time is right, the phase known as "starting to listen" begins – that is, taking suggestions and statements from matchmakers. For the Hasidim it happens around the age of 18, sometimes even younger. For Lithuanians and Sephardim, it's around the age of 20.

"During this stage parents approach matchmakers, tell them about their son or daughter and specify what they are seeking for their child. Finally, much like in the job market, they give the names of their relatives, neighbors and teachers who can provide those interested with "recommendations," or simply additional details.

"When the two sides feel that the stats are good, a meeting between the couple will be arranged. In most Haredi communities the couple will meet a maximum of three times before they become engaged. In the more devout Hasidic communities, the strict rules permit only one meeting, lasting about 20 minutes. The rationale: they will probably develop feelings, and feelings are bad for business.
...
"Haya, a neighbor of mine, got hitched to a match 38 years ago and is still married. To the same man. Eight out of her 15 children got married in the same way. "We aren't looking for love," she tells me. "We don't marry because I love you or you love me. We have a common goal – to build a home in Israel – and we work together in order to achieve that aim."

Thursday, November 19, 2015

Two public lectures today in Vancouver

Two lectures, two different topics (with a little overlap:). If you're in Vancouver...

At UBC: Woodward Lecture Series: Repugnant Transactions
19 November 2015 12:30-2:00 pm
MATH Building, Room 100
"The Vancouver School of Economics is very pleased to host Nobel Laureate Alvin Roth for a free lecture entitled “Repugnant Transactions”.

AT SFU Economics: BMO Public Lecture: 
 Who Gets What and Why: The Economics of Life Choices from School Admissions to Kidney Exchange
1200 Event Room, Segal School of Business (SFU Vancouver)
500 Granville St., Vancouver
Time: 7:00 PM , Thursday, November 19, 2015
"You participate in many more markets than you may realize. From school admissions to kidney exchanges, markets are all around us - even when no money exchanges hands. Alvin Roth, winner of the 2012 Nobel Prize in Economics, explains the economics of hidden markets and how market design can help fix broken markets, and create new ones. Professor Roth will explore how we can make better decisions by matching our desires in a marketplace."

Wednesday, November 18, 2015

To help Paris, donate blood... later (guest post by Carmen Wang)

Carmen Wang writes:

To help Paris, donate blood... later.

Paris needs blood donations in the aftermath of the Attacks, although not that much more than a typical Saturday (EFS press release). Real shortages, however, are very likely in the upcoming winter and holiday season. Market designers point out that blood donations, with kind intention, can happen at wrong times. Instead, would-be donors can register their names and availability with the blood service, and help later when blood is most needed.

Paris:
Long queues to donate blood everywhere 



EFS (French Blood Service) informing of enough blood supply and asking donors to come back later



Boston in 2013:
Various calls for blood donations after the Boston Marathon Bombing, for example


(Notice the time of this tweet and that of the next tweet)

The American Red Cross politely declining more blood donations



What happened in the two cities are not coincidences.

Similar phenomenon in blood donations has happened during so many disasters like 9/11, Hurricane Katrina, Victoria Bushfire in Australia. In severe cases, it leads to blood, the gift of life, being left expired on the shelf. However, in 'normal' times most countries suffer recurring blood shortages, especially during winter, due to the holiday season and that many regular donors are affected by cold and flu. Particularly this time in Paris, the winter is coming. The blood collected today will expire in a few weeks right at beginning of the winter months. Moreover, donors who donated today, when there is no real blood shortage, will not be able to donate in winter when shortages do occur. We can only donate blood approximately once every 3 months. Blood is so precious, so donate wisely.

The reason why the above phenomenon repeats itself across the world is because blood donations need to follow the demand for blood, but most people do not have the necessary information. In addition, other people's donations also affects the supply of blood in real time, which makes it impossible for an individual donor to decide whether it is a good time to donate blood. In Paris, we do want to help those who are injured in the Attacks, but not all donors need to respond at the same time. Too many donations can quickly lead to wasteful congestion and oversupply, and worse, potentially affect the blood supply immediately afterwards.

The solution is surprisingly simple, which is to set up a blood donation registry. People who want to help now can sign up in a registry, and commit to donate later when a blood shortage does occur. After all, a need for blood anytime is a need for blood. What difference does it make if it occurs during the Paris Attacks, Boston Marathon Bombing, Australia's Victoria Bushfire versus other 'ordinary' times? The blood service, which knows the need for blood at any given time, can contact donors in the registry to meet any excess demand for blood, and maintain an adequate level of blood supply in the long term. With the help of the registry, registered donors can be informed correctly not only when there is a potential shortage in aggregate, but more importantly, when their donations are needed and when others have donated enough. 
So to people in Paris, how about a registry in memory of Paris Attacks? The registry not only helps smooth out supply in disaster times, but also helps donors to stay informed, and donate whenever there is a need in normal times. And to donors anywhere in the world, the need for blood in your local area might be more than that in Paris as today. If you would've helped were you in Paris, maybe someone needs your help right now right around you.


More details, see paperSlonim, Robert, Carmen Wang, and Ellen Garbarino (2014). The Market for BloodThe Journal of Economic Perspectives, 28(2), 177-196.
And two upcoming working papers (inquire authors for more information)Slonim, Robert and Carmen Wang (2015), Market design for altruistic supply: Evidence from the Lab


Garbarino, Ellen, Stephanie Heger, Robert Slonim and Carmen Wang, Redesigning markets for blood donations: A blood donation registry

Tuesday, November 17, 2015

Herb Scarf, RIP

Rakesh Vohra memorializes Herb Scarf (1930-2015) with a quote from Horace, and passes along the sad news that Scarf passed away two days ago, on November 15.

Scarf was, as Vohra says, a colossus at the intersection of economics and operations research.

In my small corner of the world, a very important paper was Shapley and Scarf (1974), "On Cores and Indivisibility," published in volume 1 number 1 of the Journal of Mathematical Economics. It built on Scarf's work on the core of games without sidepayments, and introduced a way of thinking about barter for indivisible goods, via the top trading cycle algorithm (which Shapley and Scarf attributed to David Gale).

***************
Update: see obituraries,
http://economics.yale.edu/news/memory-herbert-e-scarf-july-25-1930-november-15-2015 

http://www.legacy.com/obituaries/nytimes/obituary.aspx?page=lifestory&pid=176545873

Monday, November 16, 2015

Algorithmic Game Theory and Practice Nov. 16 – Nov. 20, 2015 at the Simons Institute

At Berkeley's Simons Institute for the Theory of Computing
  • Click on the titles of individual talks for abstract, slides and archived video (available approximately one week after the conclusion of the workshop).
  • Talks will also be streamed live on this page during the workshop.
Please note that this schedule is subject to change. All events take place in the Calvin Lab Auditorium.
Monday, November 16th, 2015
9:00 am – 9:20 am
Coffee & Check-In
9:20 am – 9:30 am
Opening Remarks
9:30 am – 10:10 am
10:10 am – 10:40 am
Break
10:40 am – 11:20 am
11:20 am – 12:00 pm
12:00 pm – 1:30 pm
Lunch
1:30 pm – 2:10 pm
2:10 pm – 2:50 pm
2:50 pm – 3:20 pm
Break
3:20 pm – 4:00 pm
4:00 pm – 5:00 pm
Reception
Tuesday, November 17th, 2015
9:00 am – 9:30 am
Coffee & Check-In
9:30 am – 10:10 am
10:10 am – 10:40 am
Break
10:40 am – 11:20 am
11:20 am – 12:00 pm
12:00 pm – 1:30 pm
Lunch
1:30 pm – 2:10 pm
2:10 pm – 2:40 pm
Break
2:40 pm – 4:00 pm
Wednesday, November 18th, 2015
9:00 am – 9:30 am
Coffee & Check-In
9:30 am – 10:10 am
10:10 am – 10:40 am
Break
10:40 am – 11:20 am
11:20 am – 12:00 pm
12:00 pm – 1:30 pm
Lunch
1:30 pm – 2:10 pm
2:10 pm – 2:50 pm
2:50 pm – 3:20 pm
Break
3:20 pm – 4:00 pm
Thursday, November 19th, 2015
9:00 am – 9:30 am
Coffee & Check-In
9:30 am – 10:10 am
10:10 am – 10:40 am
Break
10:40 am – 11:20 am
11:20 am – 12:00 pm
12:00 pm – 1:30 pm
Lunch
1:30 pm – 2:10 pm
2:10 pm – 2:50 pm
2:50 pm – 3:20 pm
Break
3:20 pm – 4:00 pm
Friday, November 20th, 2015
9:00 am – 9:30 am
Coffee & Check-In
9:30 am – 10:10 am
10:10 am – 10:40 am
Break
10:40 am – 11:20 am
11:20 am – 12:00 pm

Sunday, November 15, 2015

The legal marijuana market in Colorado

Colorado Amendment 64, legalizing recreational marijuana use, was passed in 2012 and went into full effect in January 2014. Legal sales are becoming big business, presumably not just at the expense of previously illegal sales in former black markets.
From http://www.thecannabist.co/2015/02/12/colorado-marijuana-sales-2014-700-million/27565/ 


This brings in tax revenues too: Colorado pot taxes: Over the first six months of 2015, the state has pulled in a total of $60.7 million in marijuana taxes, fees


Here are the regulations regarding retail marijuana use in the city of Denver.

I haven't read reports of increases in traffic accidents or crime, although the New Republic has a story saying that all the additional marijuana is driving up real estate prices, as tourists and growers compete for residential and commercial real estate: The Housing Crisis Amid Denver’s Cannabis Boom

Saturday, November 14, 2015

Refugee resettlement, on Bloomberg Surveillance

Early yesterday morning, I was interviewd for 5 minutes about refugee resettlement on
Bloomberg Surveillance: Yergin, Alloway and Roth
Nov 13, 2015
Bloomberg Surveillance with Tom Keene and Michael McKee. GUESTS: Dan Yergin Vice Chairman IHS Inc joins Surveillance to discuss oil and commodities Tracy Alloway Executive Editor:Media Markets Bloomberg Editorial on What’s Moving Markets Alvin Roth Professor:Economics Stanford University Roth on matching markets and refugee resettlement.
Download

or here: http://media.bloomberg.com/bb/avfile/News/Surveillance/vwGKliX5qMZY.mp3

My five minutes are from minute 34:15 to 39:30.

All this happened hours before the terrorist attacks in Paris, which I fear will have a very chilling effect on refugee resettlment in Europe.

Friday, November 13, 2015

Canice Prendergast on The Allocation of Food to Food Banks

Market design has arrived at Chicago, here's a nice paper presented at the recent NBER market design conference.:

The Allocation of Food to Food Banks 
Canice Prendergast∗ Preliminary Draft August 13, 2015

Abstract Food banks throughout the U.S. provide nutrition to the needy. Yet the food that is distributed through food banks often originates with donors - large manufacturers or distributors - far from those needy clients. How that food is distributed to food banks across the country is the subject of this essay. An informal description is given of an innovation introduced in 2005 by Feeding America (at the time the organization was called America’s Second Harvest) that would better allow food bank preferences to be reflected in their allocations. Specifically, Feeding America transitioned from the centralized allocation process, where they would make decisions based on their perception of food bank need, to one where local affiliates would bid for food items. To do so, Feeding America constructed a specialized constructed currency called “shares” that are used to bid on loads of donated food. The process by which this change came about, its necessary idiosyncrasies, and its outcomes are described.
***********
Scott Kominers pointed me to an earlier news article on the paper
What happens when America's Soviet-style food banks embrace free-market economics?

"Initially, there was plenty of resistance. As one food bank director told Canice Prendergast, an economist advising Feeding America, "I am a socialist. That's why I run a food bank. I don't believe in markets. I'm not saying I won't listen, but I am against this." But the Chicago economists managed to design a market that worked even for participants who did not believe in it."

Thursday, November 12, 2015

Interview about market design by the National Association of Real Estate Investment Trusts

An interview about market design by the National Association of Real Estate Investment Trusts inevitably turned to the real estate market...

Nobel Prize Winner Alvin Roth Plays the Match Game  By Allen Kenney

Here's the final question and answer:

REIT: What about on a more discrete level? If you’re an executive in the real estate industry, for example, how might you know if you could get better results by changing how you engage in your own micro-markets for deals?
Roth: I’m a sometimes observer and participant in the residential real estate market. The large role still played by realtors is surprising to me as prices and searchability have gone up.
There was a time when the multiple listing service was a monopoly that made it hard to know what houses were on the market if you didn’t engage a realtor. Nowadays, it’s much easier to know what houses are on the market. You can even take virtual tours.
Still, realtors’ commissions have remained steadily at high rates around the country, even as prices have gone up. Of course, there’s more competition among realtors, so it’s not necessarily the case that realtors are all getting rich. But I’m surprised by the high commissions that are still extracted in cases when it’s not clear to me that the realtors are providing a big service.
If commercial real estate is similar, there might be ways to arrange more bilateral transactions. There might be ways to sell without so much assistance from realtors.

Wednesday, November 11, 2015

The singularity is not as near as you thought...

Artificial intelligence may not be poised to take over the world just yet, or at least there will be a distribution of intelligence even among the artificial kind.

I received an email from a biomedical literature service that would like me to sign up to keep track of articles related to one of mine, specifically

Roth AE: The art of designing markets. Harv Bus Rev; 2007 Oct;85(10):118-26, 166, PMID: 17972500

The top three related papers they suggest are (emphasis added)

1. The art of designing markets.
Roth AE.
Harv Bus Rev; 2007 Oct;85(10):118-26, 166.

2. [Art therapy and "art brut"].
Kovács E, Simon L.
Psychiatr Hung; 2010;25(4):323-32.

3. [Multiple pregnancies after ART: problems and possible solutions].
Shebl O, Ebner T, Sommergruber M, Sir A, Urdl W, Tews G.
Gynakol Geburtshilfliche Rundsch; 2007;47(1):3-8.




Tuesday, November 10, 2015

A plea for kidney sales in the Atlantic, from an Orthodox rabbi

Writing in the Atlantic, kidney donor Shmuly Yanklowitz argues that it would be easier for more people to do as he did if kidney donors could be paid.

Give a Kidney, Get a Check
Some people in poorer countries are compelled to sell their organs on the black market. Why not build a regulated system that compensates them fairly and ensures their safety? 

Yanklowitz is an Orthodox rabbi: here's a bit of his bio:

Rabbi Dr. Shmuly Yanklowitz is the Founder and President of Uri L’Tzedek. In 2012 and 2013, Newsweek rated Rav Shmuly one of the top 50 rabbis in America. Rav Shmuly is the author of 7 books on Jewish Ethics. He studied at the University of Texas as an undergraduate and Harvard University for a Masters in Leadership and Psychology, and he completed a second Masters degree in Jewish Philosophy at Yeshiva University. He completed his doctorate at Columbia University in Moral Development and Epistemology, and has taught as an instructor of moral philosophy at Barnard College and at the UCLA Law School. Shmuly was ordained as a Rabbi by Yeshivat Chovevei Torah (the YCT Rabbinical School) as a Wexner Graduate Fellow prior to which he studied Talmud and Jewish law at Yeshivat Hamivtar in Efrat, Israel for two years.

Monday, November 9, 2015

Assisted suicide legislation is clarified in Germany (family members won't be prosecuted, but professional assistance is forbidden)

Timo Mennle writes  from Zurich:

"the German parliament ("Bundestag") passed a new law concerning assisted suicide. The law generally forbids aiding others in their own suicide. However, it has two important points: first, it imposes a penalty of up to 3 years imprisonment if assistance for suicide is provided in a "business-like" fashion. This explicitly rules out the provision of such services for profit but also the professional provision by organization. Second, relatives and persons with a close relationships are exempt from punishment if they assist in a suicide out
of “altruistic motives.” The same is true for medical doctors in case of
decisions on a by-case basis. The new law closes a legal gap that previously left medial doctors and relatives in an ambiguous situation.

The express purpose of the new law is to "prevent a habituation of society to assisted suicide and to prevent the pressuring of old or sick persons into killing themselves." The vote in parliament was taken anonymously; the usual obligation of the members of parliament to vote according to their respective party's recommendation was explicitly suspended and they were asked to follow only their own conscience in this decision.

This and more information can be found in the following news articles
(unfortunately in German):

An English article about the topic can be found here:

Sunday, November 8, 2015

More on (third party) litigation financing, including a medieval word, "champerty"

In the NY Times: Should You Be Allowed to Invest in a Lawsuit?
In recent years, investors have started buying shares in other people’s
litigation proceedings. Are they warping the legal system in the process?
By MATTATHIAS SCHWARTZ

"Despite the hypercapitalist spirit of its rise, litigation finance actually has its roots in antiquity. According to Max Radin, a historian of ancient city-states, members of Athenian political clubs would back each other in lawsuits against their rivals. Apollodorus, a wealthy banker’s son, bought shares of lawsuits and hired professional orators — some of the earliest lawyers in Western history — to write his court speeches. The Romans tolerated the practice in some cases until the sixth century, when it was banned by Emperor Anastasius. The Roman taboo on litigation finance, Radin writes, sprang from the idea that ‘‘a controversy properly concerned only the persons actually involved in the original transaction,’’ not self-interested meddlers. In medieval England, litigants could hire ‘‘champions’’ to represent them in ‘‘trial by battle.’’ By the late 13th century, these strongmen were being compared to prostitutes, and their prevalence hastened the movement of dispute resolution to the courtroom. During the Middle Ages, this concept of ‘‘champerty’’ — assisting another person’s lawsuit in exchange for a share of the proceeds — emerged as part of the larger ecclesiastical taboo against usury. Though the word was associated with feudal land grabs, Radin notes that in practice, champerty was used by rich lawyers ‘‘on behalf of propertied defendants.’’ In 1787, Jeremy Bentham, the political philosopher, mocked prohibitions on champerty as a holdover from feudal days, where courts were beholden to ‘‘the sword of a baron, stalking into court with a rabble of retainers at his heels.’’
Nevertheless, a vestigial squeamishness about investing in lawsuits made its way across the Atlantic. The first such disputes, early in the 20th century, were over contingency fees, the practice, now common, of lawyers taking on a case in exchange for a percentage of future damages. Unlike England, which still caps fees for winning solicitors, America was open to this kind of payment structure, in keeping with its frontier ethic toward credit and speculation. Twenty-eight states now explicitly permit champerty, as long as funders do not act out of malice, back frivolous lawsuits or exert too much control over trial strategy."
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For previous posts on litigation financing, see here, here, and here.