Economic impossibilities for our grandchildren?

Economic Possibilities for our Children

Keynes was writing in the midst of the Great Depression, but also as the results of the first two technology revolutions1 were being felt throughout society. Today, we are in the midst of the Third Technology Revolution 2 (TR3), which will do more than just increase productivity. It is likely to reduce the labor component of the maginal cost of production towards zero: In other words, TR3 is li...

Impossibilities for probabilistic assignment

We consider the problem of assigning objects probabilistically among a group of agents who may have multi-unit demands. Each agent has linear preferences over the (set of) objects. The most commonly used extension of preferences to compare probabilistic assignments is by means of stochastic dominance, which leads to corresponding notions of envy-freeness, efficiency, and strategy-proofness. We ...

Impossibilities for roommate problems

We establish three impossibility results for roommate problems. First, no single valued solution is Pareto optimal and anonymous. Next, no solution satisfies Pareto optimality, anonymity and converse consistency. Finally, no pseudo refinement of the core satisfies consistency. ∗This research dates back to 2001, when I was a visiting graduate student at the University of Rochester. I owe special...

Logical impossibilities in biological networks

Biological networks are complex and involve several kinds of molecules. For proper biological function it is important for these biomolecules to act at an individual level and act at the level of interaction of these molecules. In this paper some of the logical impossibilities that may arise in the biological networks and their possible solutions are discussed. It may be important to understand...

The end of poverty: economic possibilities for our time.