Weighted and Roughly Weighted Simple Games

Abstract

This paper contributes to the program of numerical characterisation and classification of simple games outlined in the classical monograph of von Neumann and Morgenstern (1944). One of the most fundamental questions of this program is what makes a simple game a weighted majority game. The necessary and sufficient conditions that guarantee weightedness were obtained by Elgot (1961) and refined by Taylor and Zwicker (1992) If a simple game does not have weights, then rough weights may serve as a reasonable substitute (see their use in Taylor and Zwicker, 1992). A simple game is roughly weighted if there exists a system of weights and a threshold such that all coalitions whose combined weight is above the threshold are winning and all coalitions whose combined weight is below the threshold are losing and a tie-breaking is needed to classify the coalitions whose combined weight is exactly the threshold. Not all simple games are roughly weighted, and the class of projective games is a prime example.

In this paper we give necessary and sufficient conditions for a simple game to have rough weights. We define two functions f(n) and g(n) that measure the deviation of a simple game from a weighted majority game and roughly weighted majority game, respectively. We formulate known results in terms of lower and upper bounds for these functions and improve those bounds. We also investigate rough weightedness of simle games with a small number of players.

Keywords: simple game, trade robust, rough weights, projective game

JEL Classification: C71