Advanced Microeconomics

Matching: Theory and Applications.

Antonio Romero.

UC3M – Academic year 2013-2014. Second semester.

How to match people to other people or goods is an important social problem. We can mention

several examples as school placement, university admissions and organ donation.

The economics of matching has a long tradition and a well-defined set of tools. The objective of

this course is to get students to research frontier in this area. We will use most of our time

discussing problems, papers that approach them and possible new questions. We will make

emphasis in areas where there has been recent activity. Therefore, some sections of this syllabus

might be subject to changes.

Class 1. Introduction and basic Two-sided matching theory.

Class 2. Design of labor markets: National Resident Matching Program (NRMP).

Class 3. One-sided matching: basic theory.

Class 4. One-sided matching Application: Kidney exchange and university housing.

Class 5. School choice: basic theory and recent developments.

Class 6. Random assignment.

Class 7. Matching with complex preferences.

Grading

The requirements for this course are to write two referee reports (20% each) and a research

paper (60%).

The referee reports are due on Class #3 and Class #5. The papers students may write referee

reports on are labeled in the reading list (to be provided).

The Suggested length of the final paper is between 15 to 20 pages but it can vary within a

reasonable limit. I prefer an original research paper, but a critical literature review is also

welcome. A joint paper by up to two students are allowed, but in that case the suggested length

is 20-30 pages

References

Roth, Alvin, and Marilda Sotomayor. Two-Sided Matching: A Study in Game-Theoretic

Modeling and Analysis. Cambridge, United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press, 1992.

ISBN: 9780521437882.

Sönmez, Tayfun, and M. Utku Ünver. Matching, Allocation, and Exchange of Discrete

Resources. Handbook of Social Economics, Volume 1A, 2011 Elsevier B.V. ISSN 0169-7218,

DOI: 10.1016/S0169-7218(11)01017-3.

Web Resources

Al Roth's website http://kuznets.fas.harvard.edu/~aroth/alroth.html