Utility-Fairness Trade-Offs and How to Find Them

arXiv:2404.09454v1 Announce Type: cross
Abstract: When building classification systems with demographic fairness considerations, there are two objectives to satisfy: 1) maximizing utility for the specific task and 2) ensuring fairness w.r.t. a known demographic attribute. These objectives often compete, so optimizing both can lead to a trade-off between utility and fairness. While existing works acknowledge the trade-offs and study their limits, two questions remain unanswered: 1) What are the optimal trade-offs between utility and fairness? and 2) How can we …

abstract arxiv building classification cs.cv cs.cy cs.lg fairness systems them trade trade-off type utility