We investigate the effect of group versus individual decision-making in the context of risky investment decisions in which all subjects are fully informed of the probabilities and payoffs. Although there is full information, the lottery choices pose cognitive challenges so that people may not be...

We show in a public goods experiment on three continents that conditional cooperation is a universal behavioral regularity. Yet, the number of conditional cooperators and the extent of conditional cooperation are much higher in the U.S.A. than anywhere else.

Risk and reliability dominate water supply discussions in the arid western United States. In the past, water managers built additional storage to mitigate supply risk. The optimal, least expensive storage sites have now been taken, and there are strong, environmental objections to new...

We use an experimental market with externalities to test whether inequality aversion could help explain the popularity of earmarking tax revenues. We find that voter opposition is not fully explained by material self-interest: Results indicate that preferences for fairness influence voting...

Using a threshold public good experiment, we examine how varying degrees of inequality in resources and differences in risk of loss among players affect the success of group efforts to avoid a common loss. We find that when the poor face greater risk than the rich, contributions and success in...