More from the Author

• Article | Management Science | December 2012

  On the Efficiency-Fairness Trade-Off

  Dimitris Bertsimas, Vivek F. Farias and Nikolaos Trichakis

  This paper deals with a basic issue: How does one approach the problem of designing the "right" objective for a given resource allocation problem? The notion of what is right can be fairly nebulous; we consider two issues that we see as key: efficiency and fairness. We approach the problem of designing objectives that account for the natural tension between efficiency and fairness in the context of a framework that captures a number of resource allocation problems of interest to managers. More precisely, we consider a rich family of objectives that have been well studied in the literature for their fairness properties. We deal with the problem of selecting the appropriate objective from this family. We characterize the trade-off achieved between efficiency and fairness as one selects different objectives, and we develop several concrete managerial prescriptions for the selection problem based on this trade-off. Finally, we demonstrate the value of our framework in a case study that considers air traffic management.

  Keywords: resource allocation; fairness; decision support;

  Citation:

  Bertsimas, Dimitris, Vivek F. Farias, and Nikolaos Trichakis. "On the Efficiency-Fairness Trade-Off." Management Science 58, no. 12 (December 2012): 2234–2250.

  CiteView DetailsFind at Harvard

  Related

• Working Paper | HBS Working Paper Series | 2011

  Fairness, Efficiency and Flexibility in Organ Allocation for Kidney Transplantation

  Dimitris Bertsimas, Vivek F. Farias and Nikolaos Trichakis

  We propose a scalable, data-driven method for designing national policies for the allocation of deceased donor kidneys to patients on a waiting list, in a fair and efficient way. We focus on policies that have the same form as the one currently used in the U.S. In particular, we consider policies that are based on a point system, which ranks patients according to some priority criteria, e.g., waiting time, medical urgency, etc., or a combination thereof. Rather than making specific assumptions about fairness principles or priority criteria, our method offers the designer the flexibility to select his desired criteria and fairness constraints from a broad class of allowable constraints. The method then designs a point system that is based on the selected priority criteria, and approximately maximizes medical efficiency, i.e., life year gains from transplant, while simultaneously enforcing selected fairness constraints. Among the several case studies we present employing our method, one case study designs a point system that has the same form, uses the same criteria and satisfies the same fairness constraints as the point system that was recently proposed by U.S. policymakers. In addition, the point system we design delivers an 8% increase in extra life year gains. We evaluate the performance of all policies under consideration using the same statistical and simulation tools and data as the U.S. policymakers use. Other case studies perform a sensitivity analysis (for instance, demonstrating that the increase in extra life year gains by relaxing certain fairness constraints can be as high as 30%), and also pursue the design of policies targeted specifically at remedying criticisms leveled at the recent point system proposed by U.S. policymakers.

  Keywords: Fairness; Policy; Health Disorders; Marketplace Matching; Performance Effectiveness; Rank and Position; Health Industry; United States;

  Citation:

  Bertsimas, Dimitris, Vivek F. Farias, and Nikolaos Trichakis. "Fairness, Efficiency and Flexibility in Organ Allocation for Kidney Transplantation." Harvard Business School Working Paper, No. 12–025, October 2011.

  CiteView DetailsRead Now

  Related

• Article | Operations Research | Forthcoming

  Fairness, Efficiency and Flexibility in Organ Allocation for Kidney Transplantation

  Dimitris Bertsimas, Vivek F. Farias and Nikolaos Trichakis

  We propose a scalable, data-driven method for designing national policies for the allocation of deceased donor kidneys to patients on a waiting list, in a fair and efficient way. We focus on policies that have the same form as the one currently used in the United States. In particular, we consider policies that are based on a point system, which ranks patients according to some priority criteria, e.g., waiting time, medical urgency, etc., or a combination thereof. Rather than making specific assumptions about fairness principles or priority criteria, our method offers the designer the flexibility to select his desired criteria and fairness constraints from a broad class of allowable constraints. The method then designs a point system that is based on the selected priority criteria and approximately maximizes medical efficiency, i.e., life year gains from transplant, while simultaneously enforcing selected fairness constraints. Among the several case studies we present employing our method, one case study designs a point system that has the same form, uses the same criteria, and satisfies the same fairness constraints as the point system that was recently proposed by U.S. policymakers. In addition, the point system we design delivers an 8% increase in extra life year gains. We evaluate the performance of all policies under consideration using the same statistical and simulation tools and data as the U.S. policymakers use. Other case studies perform a sensitivity analysis (for instance, demonstrating that the increase in extra life year gains by relaxing certain fairness constraints can be as high as 30%) and also pursue the design of policies targeted specifically at remedying criticisms leveled at the recent point system proposed by U.S. policymakers.

  Keywords: fairness; health care policy; healthcare;

  Citation:

  Bertsimas, Dimitris, Vivek F. Farias, and Nikolaos Trichakis. "Fairness, Efficiency and Flexibility in Organ Allocation for Kidney Transplantation." Operations Research (forthcoming).

  CiteView Details

  Related