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Cooperation and Punishment in Public Goods Experiments
Fehr, Ernst; Gaechter, Simon - Institut für Volkswirtschaftslehre, …
This paper provides evidence that free riders are heavily punished even if punishment is costly and does not provide any material benefits for the punisher. The more free riders negatively deviate from the group standard the more they are punished. As a consequence, the existence of an...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005760920
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The Role of Equality, Efficiency, and Rawlsian Motives in Social Preferences: A Reply to Engelmann and Strobel
Fehr, Ernst; Schmidt, Klaus M. - Institut für Volkswirtschaftslehre, …
In a recent paper Engelmann and Strobl claim that a combination of a preference for efficiency and a Rawlsian motive for helping the least well-off is far more important than inequity aversion. Here we show that the relevance of the efficiency motive is largely restricted to students of...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005627893
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Heterogeneous social preferences and the dynamics of free riding in public goods
Fischbacher, Urs; Gächter, Simon - Institut für Volkswirtschaftslehre, … - 2005
We provide a direct test of the role of social preferences in voluntary cooperation. We elicit individuals’ cooperation preference in one experiment and make a point prediction about the contribution to a repeated public good. This allows for a novel test as to whether there are "types" of...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005585644
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A Theory of Fairness, Competition and Cooperation
Fehr, Ernst; Schmidt, Klaus M. - Institut für Volkswirtschaftslehre, …
There is strong evidence that people exploit their bargaining power in competitive markets but not in bilateral bargaining situations. There is also strong evidence that people exploit free-riding opportunities in voluntary cooperation games. Yet, when they are given the opportunity to punish...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005760905
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Do Incentive Contracts Crowd out Voluntary Cooperation?
Fehr, Ernst; Gaechter, Simon - Institut für Volkswirtschaftslehre, …
In this paper we provide experimental evidence indicating that incentive contracts may cause a strong crowding out of reciprocity-driven voluntary cooperation. This crowding out effect constitutes costs of incentive provision that have been largely neglected by economists. In our experiments the...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005627780
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The Hidden Costs and Returns of Incentives - Trust and Trustworthiness among CEOs
Fehr, E.; List, John A. - Institut für Volkswirtschaftslehre, …
situations requiring trust and trustworthiness. As a control we compare the behavior of CEOs with the behavior of students. We … incentives. However, the availability of penalizing incentives also creates hidden returns: if a principal expresses trust by … punishment threat is not available. Thus trust seems to reinforce trustworthy behavior. Overall, trustworthiness is highest if …
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005627811
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Are People Conditionally Cooperative? Evidence from a Public Goods Experiment
Fischbacher, Urs; Gaechter, Simon; Fehr, Ernst - Institut für Volkswirtschaftslehre, …
We investigate to what extent contribution decisions to a public good depend on the contributions of others. We employ a novel experimental technique that allows us to elicit people's willingness to be conditionally cooperative, i.e., to contribute more to the public good the more the other...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005627877
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Do People Behave in Experiments as in the Field? – Evidence from Donations
Benz, Matthias; Meier, Stephan - Institut für Volkswirtschaftslehre, …
Laboratory experiments are an important methodology in economics, especially in the field of behavioral economics. However, it is still debated to what extent results from laboratory experiments can be applied to field settings. One highly important question with respect to the external validity...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005627987
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A Theory of Reciprocity
Falk, Armin; Fischbacher, Urs - Institut für Volkswirtschaftslehre, …
This paper presents a formal theory of reciprocity. Reciprocity means that people reward kind actions and punish unkind ones. The theory takes into account that people evaluate the kindness of an action not only by its consequences but also by the intention underlying this action. The theory...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005627997
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Noblesse Oblige? Determinants of Survival in a Life and Death Situation
Frey, Bruno S.; Savage, David A.; Torgler, Benno - Institut für Volkswirtschaftslehre, … - 2008
This paper explored the determinants of survival in a life and death situation created by an external and unpredictable shock. We are interested to see whether pro-social behaviour matters in such extreme situations. We therefore focus on the sinking of the RMS Titanic as a quasi-natural...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10005627900