We study a collective decision-making process in which people interested in an issue may participate, at a cost, in a meeting, and the resulting decision is a compromise among the participants' preferences. We show that the equilibrium number of participants is small and their positions are...

In this paper we consider problems of the following type: Let E = { e 1 , e 2 ,..., e n } be a finite set and $${\mathcal {F}}$$ be a family of subsets of E. For each element e i in E, c i is a given capacity and $${\mathcal {w}}$$ i is the cost of increasing capacity c i by one unit. It is...

In this paper we consider problems of the following type: Let E = { e <Subscript>1</Subscript>, e <Subscript>2</Subscript>,..., e <Subscript> n </Subscript> } be a finite set and <InlineEquation ID="IEq1"> <EquationSource Format="TEX">$${\mathcal {F}}$$</EquationSource> </InlineEquation> be a family of subsets of E. For each element e <Subscript> i </Subscript> in E, c <Subscript> i </Subscript> is a given capacity and <InlineEquation ID="IEq7"> <EquationSource Format="TEX">$${\mathcal {w}}$$</EquationSource> </InlineEquation> <Subscript> i </Subscript> is the cost of increasing capacity c <Subscript> i </Subscript> by one...</subscript></subscript></equationsource></inlineequation></subscript></subscript></equationsource></inlineequation></subscript></subscript></subscript>

In this work, a sharp upper bound on the law of the logarithm for the weighted sums of random variables with multidimensional indices is obtained. The main result improves the result in [Li, Rao and Wang, 1995. On strong law of large numbers and the law of the logarithm for weighted sums of...

type="main" xml:id="rssc12036-abs-0001" <title type="main">Summary</title> <p>The paper considers data from an aphid infestation on a sugar cane plantation and illustrates the use of an individual level infectious disease model for making inference on the biological process underlying these data. The data are interval...</p>

Suppose a sequence of random variables {Xn} has negative drift when above a certain threshold and has increments bounded in Lp. When p2 this implies that EXn is bounded above by a constant independent of n and the particular 0sequence {Xn}. When p[less-than-or-equals, slant]2 there are...

We consider a system of particles moving independently on a countable state space, according to a general (non-space-homogeneous) Markov process. Under mild conditions, the number of particles at each site will converge to a product of independent Poisson distributions; this corresponds to...

A capitalist firm operating in a competitive market is subject to a growth imperative, because uncertainty about the profit rate under a no-growth policy makes the firm's prospects highly unattractive in finite time and bankruptcy practically certain in the long run. A no-growth policy...

We generalize and simplify a result of Schervish and Carlin (1992) concerning the convergence of Markov chains to their stationary distributions. We prove geometric convergence for any Markov chain whose transition operator is compact and has everywhere-positive density functions (with respect...