We describe a pair of genetic algorithms for solving two stable matching pr
oblems. Both stable matching problems we will consider involve a set of app
licants for positions and a set of employers. Each applicant and each emplo
yer prepares a rank order list of a subset of the actors in the other set.
The goal is to find an assignment of applicants to employers in which if ap
plicant a is not assigned to employer b then either a prefers his assignmen
t to b or b prefers its assignment to a. In other words, no applicant/emplo
yer pair can both improve their situations by dropping their current assign
ments in favor of each other. Our goal will be to enumerate the stable matc
hings.
One of the problems we will consider is the well-known stable marriage prob
lem, in which neither applicant nor employer preference lists are linked. I
n the other problem, we will allow pairs of applicants who form a couple to
submit joint rank order lists of ordered pairs of employers.