Econometrica

Journal Of The Econometric Society

An International Society for the Advancement of Economic
Theory in its Relation to Statistics and Mathematics

Edited by: Guido W. Imbens • Print ISSN: 0012-9682 • Online ISSN: 1468-0262

Econometrica: Nov, 1992, Volume 60, Issue 6

A Simple Axiomatization of Nonadditive Expected Utility

https://doi.org/0012-9682(199211)60:6<1255:ASAONE>2.0.CO;2-G
p. 1255-1272

Peter Wakker, Rakesh Sarin

This paper provides an extension of Savage's subjective expected utility theory for decisions under uncertainty. It includes in the set of events both unambiguous events for which probabilities are additive and ambiguous events for which probabilities are permitted to be nonadditive. The main axiom is cumulative dominance, which adapts stochastic dominance to decision making under uncertainty. We derive a Choquet expected utility representation and show that a modification of cumulative dominance leads to the classical expected utility representation. The relationship of our approach with that of Schmeidler, who uses a two-stage formulation to derive Choquet expected utility, is also explored. Our work may be viewed as a unification of Schmeidler (1989) and Gilboa (1987).


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