Understand
We study a dynamic allocation problem in which $T$ sequentially arriving divisible resources are to be allocated to a number of agents with linear utilities.
- The marginal utilities of each resource to the agents are drawn stochastically from a known joint distribution, independently and identically across time, and the central planner makes immediate and irrevocable allocation decisions.
- Most works on dynamic resource allocation aim to maximize the utilitarian welfare, i.e., the efficiency of the allocation, which may result in unfair concentration of resources on certain high-utility agents while leaving others' demands under-fulfilled.
- In this paper, aiming at balancing efficiency and fairness, we instead consider a broad collection of welfare metrics, the H\"older means, which includes the Nash social welfare and the egalitarian welfare.