Utilitarian Aggregation with Heterogeneous Beliefs

B-Tier
Journal: American Economic Journal: Microeconomics
Year: 2021
Volume: 13
Issue: 3
Pages: 112-23

Score contribution per author:

1.005 = (α=2.01 / 2 authors) × 1.0x B-tier

α: calibrated so average coauthorship-adjusted count equals average raw count

Abstract

The utilitarian aggregation rule requires social utility and beliefs to be a convex combination of individual utilities and beliefs, respectively. Since, in the case of belief heterogeneity, the standard Pareto condition is incompatible with such a separate aggregation, a new condition, called the belief-proof Pareto condition, is proposed to alleviate occurrences of spurious agreement by restricting unanimity to beliefs that can be considered reasonable by society. Then, we show, in the Anscombe-Aumann and the Savage framework, that the belief-proof Pareto condition is equivalent to separate aggregation of individual beliefs and tastes.

Technical Details

RePEc Handle
repec:aea:aejmic:v:13:y:2021:i:3:p:112-23
Journal Field
General
Author Count
2
Added to Database
2026-01-24