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on Evolutionary Economics |
| By: | Luca Anderlini (Georgetown University, University of Naples Federico II and CSEF); Larry Samuelson (Yale University); Daniele Terlizzese (EIEF) |
| Abstract: | We examine an economy in which interactions are more productive if agents can trust others to refrain from cheating. Some agents are scoundrels, who always cheat, while others cheat only if the cost of cheating, a decreasing function of the proportion of cheaters, is sufficiently low. The economy exhibits multiple equilibria. As the proportion of scoundrels in the economy declines, the high-trust equilibrium can be disrupted by arbitrarily small perturbations or infusions of low-trust agents, while the low-trust equilibrium becomes impervious to perturbations and infusions of high-trust agents. The resilience of trust may thus hinge upon the prevalence of scoundrels. |
| Keywords: | Trust, Robustness, Fragility, Assimilation, Disruption. |
| JEL: | C72 C79 D02 D80 |
| Date: | 2024–03–23 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:sef:csefwp:710&r=evo |
| By: | Snir, Avichai; Levy, Dudi; Wang, Dian; Chen, Haipeng (Allan); Levy, Daniel |
| Abstract: | Many experimental studies report that economics students tend to act more selfishly than students of other disciplines, a finding that received widespread public and professional attention. Two main explanations that the existing literature offers for the differences found in the behavior between economists and non-economists are: (i) the selection effect, and (ii) the indoctrination effect. We offer an alternative, novel explanation: we argue that these differences can be explained by differences in the interpretation of the context. We test this hypothesis by conducting two social dilemma experiments in the US and Israel with participants from both economics and non-economics majors. In the experiments, participants face a tradeoff between profit maximization (market norm) and workers’ welfare (social norm). We use priming to manipulate the cues that the participants receive before they make their decision. We find that when participants receive cues signaling that the decision has an economic context, both economics and non-economics students tend to maximize profits. When the participants receive cues emphasizing social norms, on the other hand, both economics and non-economics students are less likely to maximize profits. We conclude that some of the differences found between the decisions of economics and non-economics students can be explained by contextual cues. |
| Keywords: | Self-Selection, Indoctrination, Self-Interest, Market Norms, Social Norms, Economic Man, Rational Choice, Fairness, Experimental Economics, Laboratory Experiments, Priming, Economists vs Non-Economists, Behavioral Economics |
| JEL: | A11 A12 A13 A20 B40 C90 C91 D01 D63 D91 P10 |
| Date: | 2024 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:esprep:294172&r=evo |
| By: | Davis, John B.; ; (Department of Economics Marquette University; Department of Economics Marquette University) |
| Abstract: | Stratification economics (SE) investigates how economies are organized around group inequalities, especially by race and gender but also by ethnicity, national origin, religion, sexual orientation, etc. Its historical origins and theoretical foundations have both a structural strand that addresses how and a social behavioral strand. SE's structural strand goes back to Ricardo and Marx regarding the relationship between growth and distribution, and then draws on recent economic theory of noncompeting groups and dual economy models of labor market segmentation. SE's structural strand produces an inequality-based understanding of economics' standard goods taxonomy. The social behavioral strand builds on Du Bois's psychological wage concept, Veblen's social ladders theory of emulation, Blumer's theory of prejudice and stereotyping, and current social identity theory. SE's social behavioral strand makes it possible to explain how discrimination selectively stigmatizes people's social identities in order to reinforce existing intergroup inequalities. |
| Keywords: | stratification economics, intergroup inequality, caste, social groups, Ricardo, Marx, Lewis, Du Bois, Veblen, Blumer, social identity theory, goods taxonomy, stigmatization, intersectionality |
| JEL: | D31 D63 I31 J15 J16 Z13 |
| Date: | 2024–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mrq:wpaper:2024-02&r=evo |
| By: | Luca Anderlini (Georgetown University, University of Naples Federico II and CSEF); Leonardo Felli (University of Cambridge); Michele Piccione (London School of Economics.) |
| Abstract: | How do mechanisms that enforce cooperation emerge in a society where none are available and agents are endowed with raw power, that allows a more powerful agent to expropriate a less powerful one? We study a model where expropriation is costly and agents can choose whether to engage in surplus-augmenting cooperation or engage in expropriation. While in bilateral relations, if cooperation is not overwhelmingly productive and expropriation is not too costly, the latter will prevent cooperation, when there are three or more agents, powerful ones can become enforcers of cooperation for agents ranked below them. In equilibrium they will expropriate smaller amounts from multiple weaker cooperating agents who in turn will not deviate for fear of being expropriated more heavily because of their larger expropriation proceeds. Surprisingly, the details of the power structure are irrelevant for the existence of equilibria with enforcement provided that enough agents are present and one is ranked above all others. These details are instead key to the existence of other highly noncooperative equilibria that obtain in certain cases. |
| Keywords: | Jungle, Power Structures, Enforcement, Rule of Law. |
| JEL: | C79 D00 D01 D31 K19 K40 K49 |
| Date: | 2024–03–23 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:sef:csefwp:711&r=evo |
| By: | Gregory Clark (University of Southern Denmark, LSE, CEPR); Neil Cummins (LSE, CEPR); Matthew Curtis (University of Southern Denmark) |
| Abstract: | The European Marriage Pattern (EMP), in place in NW Europe for perhaps 500 years, substantially limited fertility. But how could such limitation persist when some individuals who deviated from the EMP norm had more children? If their children inherited their deviant behaviors, their descendants would quickly become the majority of later generations. This puzzle has two possible solutions. The first is that all those that deviated actually had lower net fertility over multiple generations. We show, however, no fertility penalty to future generations from higher initial fertility. Instead the EMP survived because even though the EMP persisted at the social level, children did not inherit their parents' individual fertility choices. In the paper we show evidence consistent with lateral, as opposed to vertical, transmission of EMP fertility behaviors. |
| Keywords: | Demography, Economic History, European Marriage Pattern, Selection Pressures |
| JEL: | N13 N11 J12 |
| Date: | 2024–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hes:wpaper:0259&r=evo |