Problems for the February 13 lecture

Just to get you a bit more hands-on quasiconcave functions. For each answer: check if it verifies your intuition on utility functions that represent convex preferences!

Throughout the problems, let f(x) and g(x) be quasiconcave and defined on the same convex set in n-space, and let m(t) be a strictly increasing function of a single variable, defined for all real t.

  • Is m quasiconcave? Strictly quasiconcave? Quasiconvex? Strictly quasiconvex?
  • Which of the following functions must be quasiconcave on their domains? 
    max{f(x), g(x)}
    min{f(x), g(x)}
    f(-x)
    m(f(x))
    (tricky?) f(x) + g(x)
  • Fix two points u and v. Define h(t) = f(tu+(1-t)v) for t between 0 and 1 (again, f is quasiconcave).
    Is the claim  "h must be either nonincreasing in t or nondecreasing in t" true or false?

 

Published Feb. 12, 2018 2:59 PM - Last modified Feb. 12, 2018 3:04 PM