Asymmetric Players in a Meritocracy: A Case for Affirmative Action
研究了不同群体在申请大学、求职或晋升等精英选拔中，因微小差异导致参与率悬殊的现象，并论证了通过补贴弱势群体等平权政策可提高其参与率并增进社会福利。
We model decisions to apply for college admission, attend job auditions, or run for C-suite positions as costly entry into meritocracies, where the entrant with the highest ability wins a reward. Ability is privately known and players generically differ in commonly known characteristics such as ability distributions, entry costs, or payoffs from winning. Any infinitesimal difference leads to wildly different equilibrium entry probabilities, explaining large dispersion in representation of comparable but nonidentical population groups. Affirmative action policies such as handicapping advantaged players or surcharging them to subsidize disadvantaged players increase participation rates of disadvantaged players and, in return, increase social welfare.