Testing Strictly Concave Rationality

Matzkin, Rosa L.
Richter, Marcel K.
1987-07
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Testing Strictly Concave Rationality

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1987-07

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Center for Economic Research, Department of Economics, University of Minnesota

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Working Paper

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We prove that the Strong Axiom of Revealed Preference tests the existence of a strictly quasiconcave (in fact, continuous, generically Coo, strictly concave, and strictly monotone) utility function generating finitely many demand observations. This sharpens earlier results of Afriat, Diewert, and Varian that tested ("nonparametrically") the existence of a piecewise linear utility function that could only weakly generate those demand observations. When observed demand is also invertible, we show that the rationalizing can be done in a Coo way, thus extending a result of Chiappori and Rochet from compact sets to all of Rn. For finite data sets, one implication of our result is that even some weak types of rational behavior - maximization of pseudotransitive or semitransitive preferences -- are observationally equivalent to maximization of continuous, strictly concave, and strictly monotone utility functions.

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Center for Economic Research Discussion Papers

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Discussion Paper
 239

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Matzkin, R.L. and Richter, M.K., (1987), "Testing Strictly Concave Rationality", Discussion Paper No. 239, Center for Economic Research, Department of Economics, University of Minnesota.

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Matzkin, Rosa L.; Richter, Marcel K.. (1987). Testing Strictly Concave Rationality. Retrieved from the University Digital Conservancy, https://hdl.handle.net/11299/55509.

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