Rationing problems with ex-ante conditions

• Paper proposes an extension of standard rationing problems or claims problems.
• Agents are not only identified by their claims, but also by some ex-ante conditions.
• Generalizations of the CEA rule and of the CEL rule are introduced.
• Both generalized rules are axiomatically characterized.

An extension of the standard rationing model is introduced. Agents are not only identified by their respective claims to some amount of a scarce resource, but also by some exogenous ex-ante conditions (initial stock of resource or net worth of agents, for instance), other than claims. Within this framework, we define a generalization of the constrained equal awards rule and provide two different characterizations of this generalized rule. Finally, we use the corresponding dual properties to characterize a generalization of the constrained equal losses rule.