The group of quasi-isometries of the real line cannot act effectively on the line (Q6091934)

This paper studies several group-theoretic properties of the group of quasi-isometries on the real line. Let \(\mathrm{QI}(X)\) denote the group of all equivalence classes of quasi-isometries from \(X\) to itself, where two quasi-isometries are equivalent whenever they are at bounded distance from each other. Let \(\mathrm{QI}^{+}(\mathbb{R})\) denote the subgroup of \(\mathrm{QI}(\mathbb{R})\) consisting of all elements that can be represented by an orientation preserving homeomorphisms. Since every element in \(\mathrm{QI}(\mathbb{R})\) has a representative that is a bi-Lipschitz homeomorphism, we see that \(\mathrm{QI}^{+}(\mathbb{R})\) is an index two subgroup. In fact, the authors show and use the following structural result: \[ \mathrm{QI}(\mathbb{R}) = (\mathrm{QI}(\mathbb{R}_{\geq 0}) \times \mathrm{QI}(\mathbb{R}_{\leq 0}) ) \rtimes \langle t \rangle, \] where \(t\) is the reflection at the origin. The main results of the paper require the following definitions. A group \(G\) is called \textit{left-orderable} if there exists a total order \(\leq\) on \(G\) such that \(g \leq h\) implies \(fg \leq fh\) for all \(f, g, h \in G\). A group action of \(G\) on \(\mathbb{R}\) is called \textit{effective} (or faithful), if the identity element is the only element acting trivially. The authors prove the following results: \begin{itemize} \item The groups \(\mathrm{QI}^{+}(\mathbb{R})\) and \(\mathrm{QI}(\mathbb{R}_{\geq 0})\) are not simple. \item The groups \(\mathrm{QI}^{+}(\mathbb{R})\) and \(\mathrm{QI}(\mathbb{R}_{\geq 0})\) are not left-orderable. \item The group \(\mathrm{QI}^{+}(\mathbb{R})\) does not act effectively on the real line. \end{itemize} The proofs for non-simplicity and non-left-orderability are done by embedding \(\mathrm{QI}(\mathbb{R}_{\geq 0})\) into \(\mathrm{QI}^{+}(\mathbb{R})\) and showing the results for \(\mathrm{QI}(\mathbb{R}_{\geq 0})\). From there, they extend to \(\mathrm{QI}^{+}(\mathbb{R})\). The final result is based on a careful understanding of effective actions of \((0,\infty) \ltimes \left( \oplus_{i \in \mathbb{R}_{\geq 1}} \mathbb{R} \right)\) and \(\widetilde{PSL_2(\mathbb{R})}\) on the real line.