Preferences

A basic component of any rational choice model is a representation of the decision maker’s preferences. We start by fixing a non-empty set \(X\) representing the feasible alternatives. Elements of \(X\) may be the items available to choose, descriptions of the likelihood of obtaining different outcomes, candidates in an election, etc. This chapter describes how to represent a decision maker’s preferences about the items in a set \(X\) and what it means to assume that a decision maker’s preferences are rational.

The main readings for this section are:

• Chapter 1: Preferences from Hausman (2012)
• Chapter 2: Preference Axioms and Their Implications from Hausman (2012)
• Chapter 2 from Gaus and Thrasher (2021)

Additional readings about preferences include:

• Section 1 and Section 2 from Hansson and Grüne-Yanoff (2022)

Gaus, Gerald, and John Thrasher. 2021. Philosophy, Politics, and Economics: An Introduction. Princeton University Press. https://press.princeton.edu/books/paperback/9780691219790/philosophy-politics-and-economics.

Hansson, Sven Ove, and Till Grüne-Yanoff. 2022. “Preferences.” In The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy, edited by Edward N. Zalta, Spring 2022. Metaphysics Research Lab, Stanford University. https://plato.stanford.edu/archives/spr2022/entries/preferences/.

Hausman, Daniel. 2012. Preference, Value, Choice, and Welfare. Cambridge University Press. https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9781139058537.