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on Experimental Economics |
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Issue of 2022‒05‒23
twenty-six papers chosen by |
| By: | Klaus Abbink (Department of Economics, Monash University); Gaurav Datt (Centre for Development Economics and Sustainability, Monash University,); Lata Gangadharan (Department of Economics, Monash University); Digvijay Negi (Indira Gandhi Institute of Development Research, India); Bharat Ramaswami (Ashoka University, India.) |
| Abstract: | Are in-kind transfers associated with deadweight losses? To answer this, we conducted an incentivized field experiment in India, which offered low-income households the choice between a free quantity of rice and varying amounts of cash to elicit their willingness to pay for rice. Contrary to expectation, we find evidence of deadweight gain on average, though with a striking contrast between a deadweight loss among respondents from female-headed households and a deadweight gain among respondents from male-headed households. Our results highlight the role of gender differences in bargaining power in shaping the choice between cash or rice. |
| Keywords: | deadweight loss, in-kind transfer, cash transfer, food subsidy, field experiment |
| JEL: | C93 D13 I38 J16 Q18 |
| Date: | 2022–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mos:moswps:2022-10&r= |
| By: | Lata Gangadharan (Monash University, Department of Economics); Philip J. Grossman (Monash University, Department of Economics); Nina Xue (Monash University, Department of Economics) |
| Abstract: | Beliefs are increasingly recognised as an important driver of behaviour, but measuring beliefs is not straightforward. We design a giving experiment to compare beliefs using different elicitation mechanisms when motivated reasoning may be present. We propose a new means of identifying self-image concerns through beliefs about the behaviour of others. Consistent with a simple theoretical framework, we find evidence of self-image biases for non-donors when beliefs are not incentivised, while donors’ beliefs are more accurate, irrespective of the incentive mechanism. Offering a binary incentive does not reduce non-donors’ pessimism about others, however, a variation of the Becker-DeGroot-Marschak (BDM) procedure does appear to “debias” their beliefs. Our results also show that belief biases do not vary with the timing of belief elicitation. |
| Keywords: | self-image, motivated beliefs, incentive mechanisms, altruism, experiment |
| JEL: | C9 D9 H4 |
| Date: | 2022–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mos:moswps:2022-05&r= |
| By: | Erika Deserranno; Stefano Caria; Philipp Kastrau; Gianmarco León-Ciliotta |
| Abstract: | A classic problem faced by organizations is to decide how to distribute incentives among their different layers. By means of a field experiment with a large public-health organization in Sierra Leone, we show that financial incentives maximize output when they are equally shared between frontline health workers and their supervisor. The impact of this intervention on completed health visits is 61% larger than the impact of incentive schemes that target exclusively the worker or the supervisor. Also, the shared incentives uniquely improve overall health-service provision and health outcomes. We use these experimental results to structurally estimate a model of service provision and find that shared incentives are effective because worker and supervisor effort are strong strategic complements, and because side payments across layers are limited. Through the use of counterfactual model experiments, we highlight the importance of effort complementarities across the different layers of an organization for optimal policy design. |
| Keywords: | Incentives, multi-layered organizations, effort complementarities, side payments, output |
| JEL: | O15 O55 I15 J31 M52 |
| Date: | 2022–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:upf:upfgen:1838&r= |
| By: | Simon Gaechter (University of Nottingham); Felix Koelle (University of Cologne); Simone Quercia (University of Verona) |
| Abstract: | We study two generic versions of public goods problems: in Provision problems, the public good does not exist initially and needs to be provided; in Maintenance problems, the public good already exists and needs to be maintained. We document a robust asymmetry in preferences and perceptions in two incentive-equivalent versions of these public good problems. We find fewer conditional cooperators and more free riders in Maintenance than Provision, a difference that is replicable, stable, and reflected in perceptions of kindness. Incentivized control questions administered before gameplay reveal dilemma-specific misperceptions but controlling for them neither eliminates game-dependent conditional cooperation, nor differences in perceived kindness of others’ cooperation. Thus, even when sharing the same game form, Maintenance and Provision are different social dilemmas that require separate behavioral analyses. A theory of revealed altruism can explain some features of our results. |
| Keywords: | maintenance and provision social dilemmas, conditional cooperation, kindness, misperceptions, experiments, revealed altruism |
| Date: | 2022–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:not:notcdx:2022-09&r= |
| By: | Zhijian Wang; Qinmei Yao; Yijia Wang |
| Abstract: | Eigen mode selection ought to be a practical issue in some real game systems, as it is a practical issue in the dynamics behaviour of a building, bridge, or molecular, because of the mathematical similarity in theory. However, its reality and accuracy have not been known in real games. We design a 5-strategy game which, in the replicator dynamics theory, is predicted to exist two eigen modes. Further, in behaviour game theory, the game is predicted that the mode selection should depends on the game parameter. We conduct human subject game experiments by controlling the parameter. The data confirm that, the predictions on the mode existence as well as the mode selection are significantly supported. This finding suggests that, like the equilibrium selection concept in classical game theory, eigen mode selection is an issue in game dynamics theory. |
| Date: | 2022–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:arx:papers:2204.08071&r= |
| By: | Alain de Janvry (University of California, Berkeley); Guojun He (Hong Kong University of Science and Technology); Elisabeth Sadoulet (University of California, Berkeley); Shaoda Wang (University of Chicago); Qiong Zhang (Renmin University of China) |
| Abstract: | Subjective performance evaluation is widely used by firms and governments to provide work incentives. However, delegating evaluation power to local senior leadership could induce influence activities: agents might devote much effort to pleasing their supervisors, rather than focusing on productive tasks that benefit their organizations. We conduct a large-scale randomized field experiment among Chinese local government employees and provide the first rigorous empirical evidence on the existence and implications of influence activities. We find that employees do engage in evaluator-specific influence to affect evaluation outcomes, and that this process can be partly observed by their co-workers. However, introducing uncertainty in the identity of the evaluator discourages evaluator-specific influence activities and significantly improves the work performance of local government employees. |
| Keywords: | subjective evaluation, influence activities, civil servants, work performance |
| JEL: | M12 D73 F63 |
| Date: | 2020–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hke:wpaper:wp2020-03&r= |
| By: | Lana Friesen (School of Economics, University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia); Ian A. MacKenzie (School of Economics, University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia); Mai Phuong Nguyen (School of Economics, University of Queensland, Brisbane, Australia) |
| Abstract: | This article investigates how the existence of initially contestable property rights affects the efficiency of the Coase theorem. We design a two-stage experiment that incorporates a stage where property rights are initially allocated to participants followed by a stage that allows bargaining between participants. In stage one, participants endogenously choose their effort (and thus the probability) to appropriate the property rights before entering an unstructured bargaining game. We find the presence of costly appropriation activity to obtain the property rights makes it significantly less likely that the efficient outcome is reached. We introduce bargaining costs and find that allowing for symmetric bargaining costs has no impact on the likelihood of the efficient outcome being reached, whereas asymmetric bargaining costs between outcomes substantially reduces the likelihood of reaching an efficient outcome. |
| Keywords: | Coasean bargaining, transaction costs, experiment, property rights, contest |
| JEL: | C92 Q52 |
| Date: | 2022–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:qld:uq2004:656&r= |
| By: | Julio J. Elias; Nicola Lacetera; Mario Macis |
| Abstract: | Price surges often generate social disapproval and requests for regulation and price controls, but these interventions may cause inefficiencies and shortages. To study how individuals perceive and reason about sudden price increases for different products under different policy regimes, we conduct a survey experiment with Canadian and U.S. residents. Econometric and textual analyses indicate that prices are not seen just as signals of scarcity; they cause widespread opposition and strong and polarized moral reactions. However, acceptance of unregulated prices is higher when potential economic tradeoffs between unregulated and controlled prices are salient and when higher production costs contribute to the price increases. The salience of tradeoffs also reduces the polarization of moral judgments between supporters and opponents of unregulated pricing. In part, the acceptance of free price adjustments is driven by people’s overall attitudes about the function of markets and the government in society. These findings are corroborated by a donation experiment, and they suggest that awareness of the causes and potential consequences of price increases may induce less extreme views about the role of market institutions in governing the economy. |
| JEL: | C83 C91 D63 D91 I11 L50 Z1 |
| Date: | 2022–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:29963&r= |
| By: | Van Borm, Hannah; Baert, Stijn |
| Abstract: | We investigate the drivers of gender differentials in hiring chances. More concretely, we test (i) whether recruiters perceive job applicants in gender stereotypical terms when making hiring decisions and (ii) whether the activation of these gender stereotypes in recruiters' minds varies by the salience of gender in a particular hiring context and the gender prototypicality of a job applicant, as hypothesised in Ridgeway and Kricheli-Katz (2013). To this end, we conduct an innovative vignette experiment in the United States with 290 genuine recruiters who evaluate fictitious job applicants regarding their hireability and 21 statements related to specific gender stereotypes. Moreover, we experimentally manipulate both the gender prototypicality of a job applicant and the salience of gender in the hiring context. We find that employers perceive women in gender stereotypical terms when making hiring decisions. In particular, women are perceived to be more social and supportive than men, but also as less assertive and physically strong. Furthermore, our results indicate that the gender prototypicality of job applicants moderates these perceptions: the less prototypical group of African American women, who are assumed to be less prototypical, are perceived in less stereotypical terms than white women, while some stereotypes are more outspoken when female résumés reveal family responsibilities. |
| Keywords: | hiring,gender discrimination,stereotypes,race,motherhood |
| JEL: | J71 J16 J15 J13 J24 |
| Date: | 2022 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:glodps:1083&r= |
| By: | Simon Gaechter (University of Nottingham); Kyeongtae Lee (Economic Research Institute, Bank of Korea); Martin Sefton (University of Nottingham) |
| Abstract: | We examine how conditional cooperation is related to the material payoffs in a Sequential Prisoner’s Dilemma experiment. We have subjects play eight SPDs with varying payoffs, systematically varying the material gain to the second-mover and the material loss to the first-mover when the second-mover defects in response to cooperation. We find that few second-movers are conditionally cooperative in all eight games, and most second-movers change their strategies from game to game. Second-movers are less likely to conditionally cooperate when the gain is higher and when the loss is lower. This pattern is consistent with models of distributional preferences. |
| Keywords: | prisoner’s dilemma, conditional cooperation, |
| Date: | 2022–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:not:notcdx:2022-10&r= |
| By: | Marina Agranov; Gabriel Lopez-Moctezuma; Philipp Strack; Omer Tamuz |
| Abstract: | We compare how well agents aggregate information in two repeated social learning environments. In the first setting agents have access to a public data set. In the second they have access to the same data, and also to the past actions of others. Despite the fact that actions contain no additional payoff relevant information, and despite potential herd behavior, free riding and information overload issues, observing and imitating the actions of others leads agents to take the optimal action more often in the second setting. We also investigate the effect of group size, as well as a setting in which agents observe private data and others’ actions. |
| JEL: | C92 D83 |
| Date: | 2022–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:nbr:nberwo:29962&r= |
| By: | Teodora Boneva; Thomas Buser; Armin Falk; Fabian Kosse |
| Abstract: | We present evidence on the role of the social environment for the development of gender differences in competitiveness and earnings expectations. First, we document that the gender gap in competitiveness and earnings expectations is more pronounced among adolescents with low socioeconomic status (SES). We further document that there is a positive association between the competitiveness of mothers and their daughters, but not between the competitiveness of mothers and their sons. Second, we show that a randomized mentoring intervention that exposes low-SES children to predominantly female role models causally affects girls' willingness to compete and narrows both the gender gap in competitiveness as well as the gender gap in earnings expectations. Together, the results highlight the importance of the social environment in shaping willingness to compete and earnings expectations at a young age. |
| Date: | 2022 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_9509&r= |
| By: | Piotr Lewandowski; Katarzyna Lipowska; Mateusz Smoter |
| Abstract: | The COVID-19 pandemic has transformed working from home from a rarity to a widely adopted job amenity. We study workers’ willingness to pay for working from home, and how it may be affected by subjective and objective assessments of COVID-19-related risks. We conducted a discrete choice experiment with more than 10,000 workers in Poland. We randomised wage differences between otherwise identical home- and office-based jobs. We also randomised an information provision treatment in which we informed 50% of workers about the level of exposure to contagion in their occupation, and how it may be reduced by working from home. We found that the demand for working from home was substantial – the majority of participants would prefer to work from home if they were offered the same wage for a home-based job as they would earn in an office-based job. On average, workers would sacrifice 5.1% of their earnings for the option to work from home, especially for 2-3 days a week (7.3%) rather than 5 days a week (2.8%). We also found that the perception of COVID-19 mattered, as workers who perceived it as a threat were willing to give up a much higher share of their earnings than those who did not. However, the willingness to pay did not differ significantly between individuals depending on whether their occupation had a high or a low level of exposure, or between individuals treated in the information experiment and those in the control group. |
| Keywords: | labour market, homeoffice, pandemic, others |
| JEL: | J21 J44 |
| Date: | 2022–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ibt:wpaper:wp032022&r= |
| By: | Field, Erica (Duke University); Vyborny, Kate (Duke University) |
| Abstract: | In cities with conservative norms or high crime, female workers may face greater restrictions on their physical mobility. This limits women’s labor market opportunities and the pool of workers that firms can attract. In this study, we experimentally vary access to a transport service in Lahore, Pakistan, to quantify the overall impact of transport to work on men, women, and the differential impact of transport exclusively for women. We show that reducing physical mobility constraints has a large impact on job searching for women, including women who are not searching at baseline. Women’s response is driven by a women-only transport treatment arm, suggesting that safety and social acceptability, rather than simply cost, are key constraints. |
| Keywords: | transport; mobility; gender; female labor force participation |
| JEL: | J16 J22 J28 L91 |
| Date: | 2022–04–28 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ris:adbewp:0655&r= |
| By: | Doerr, Annabelle; Hartmann, Carina; Sajons, Christoph |
| Abstract: | The integration of refugees in host countries' labor markets is complicated by structural barriers, missing formal qualification and language deficiencies. This leads to widespread concern that refugees may end up in informal and precarious employment relationships. Empirical evidence on the prevalence of unregistered work is missing, however, due to the sensitive and illegal nature of this phenomenon. In this paper, we conduct a list experiment to measure unregistered work among refugees in Germany. Our results indicate that 31% have had experience with an unregistered job since their arrival. Refugees who report that they do not have work permission show a significantly higher likelihood of experiencing unregistered work. Furthermore, the lack of post-secondary education and vocational degrees, and a low German proficiency predict the risk to work without registration. |
| Keywords: | Unregistered work, Informal employment, List experiment, Refugees, Germany, Survey experiment |
| JEL: | J46 J61 C83 |
| Date: | 2022–01–04 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bsl:wpaper:2022/01&r= |
| By: | Jonas Tungodden; Alexander Willén; Alexander L.P. Willén |
| Abstract: | Parents make important choices for their children in many areas of life, yet the empirical literature on this topic is scarce. We study parents’ competitiveness choices for their children by combining two large-scale artefactual field experiments with high-quality longitudinal administrative data. We document three main sets of findings. First, parents choose more competition for their sons than daughters. Second, this gender difference can largely be explained by parents’ beliefs about their children’s competitiveness preferences. Third, parents’ choices predict children's later-in-life educational outcomes. Taken together, these findings provide novel evidence on the role of parents in shaping children’s long-term outcomes. |
| Date: | 2022 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_9516&r= |
| By: | Felix Chopra; Ingar K. Haaland; Christopher Roth |
| Abstract: | We examine the relative importance of accuracy concerns and belief confirmation motives in driving the demand for news. In experiments with US respondents, we first vary beliefs about whether an outlet reports the news in a right-wing biased, left-wing biased, or unbiased way. We then measure demand for a newsletter covering articles from this outlet. Respondents only reduce their demand for biased news if the bias is inconsistent with their own political beliefs, suggesting a trade-off between accuracy concerns and belief confirmation motives. We quantify this trade-off using a structural model and find a similar quantitative importance of both motives. |
| Keywords: | news demand, media bias, accuracy concerns, belief confirmation |
| JEL: | D83 D91 L82 |
| Date: | 2022 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_9673&r= |
| By: | Summers, Kate; Accominotti, Fabien; Burchardt, Tania; Hecht, Katharina; Mann, Liz; Mijs, Jonathan J.B |
| Abstract: | In most contemporary societies, people underestimate the extent of economic inequality, resulting in lower support for taxation and redistribution than might be expressed by better informed citizens. We still know little, however, about how understandings of inequality arise, and therefore about where perceptions and misperceptions of it might come from. This methodological article takes one step toward filling this gap by developing a research design—a blueprint—to study how people’s understandings of wealth and income inequality develop through social interaction. Our approach combines insights from recent scholarship highlighting the socially situated character of inequality beliefs with those of survey experimental work testing how information about inequality changes people’s understandings of it. Specifically, we propose to use deliberative focus groups to approximate the interactional contexts in which individuals process information and form beliefs in social life. Leveraging an experimental methodology, our design then varies the social makeup of deliberative groups, as well as the information about inequality we share with participants, to explore how different types of social environments and information shape people’s understandings of economic inequality. This should let us test, in particular, whether the low socioeconomic diversity of people’s discussion and interaction networks relates to their tendency to underestimate inequality, and whether beliefs about opportunity explain people’s lack of appetite for redistributive policies. In this exploratory article we motivate our methodological apparatus and describe its key features, before reflecting on the findings from a proof-of-concept study conducted in London in the fall of 2019. |
| Keywords: | economic inequality; perceptions; public opinion; deliberative focus groups; experimental methods; Springer deal |
| JEL: | N0 |
| Date: | 2022–04–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ehl:lserod:114591&r= |
| By: | Oriana Bandiera; Nidhi Parekh; Barbara Petrongolo; Michelle Rao |
| Abstract: | Gender differences in self-confidence could explain women’s under representation in high-income occupations and glass-ceiling effects. We draw lessons from the economic literature via a survey of experts and a Bayesian hierarchical model that aggregates experimental findings over the last twenty years. The experts’ survey indicates beliefs that men are overconfident and women under-confident. Yet, the literature reveals that both men and women are typically overconfident. Moreover, the model cannot reject the hypothesis that gender differences in self-confidence are equal to zero. In addition, the estimated pooling factor is low, implying that each study contains little information over a common phenomenon. The discordance can be reconciled if the experts overestimate the pooling factor or have priors that are biased and precise. |
| Date: | 2022 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_9515&r= |
| By: | Nirav Mehta |
| Abstract: | This paper views teacher quality through the human capital perspective. Teacher quality exhibits substantial growth over teachers’ careers, but why it improves is not well understood. I use a human capital production function nesting On-the-Job-Training (OJT) and Learning-by-Doing (LBD) and experimental variation from Glewwe et al. (2010), a teacher incentive pay experiment in Kenya, to discern the presence and relative importance of these forces. The identified set for the OJT and LBD components has a closed-form solution, which depends on experimentally estimated average treatment effects. The results provide evidence of an LBD component, as well as an informative upper bound on the OJT component. |
| Keywords: | human capital, teacher quality, on-the-job training, learning-by-doing, partial identification |
| JEL: | I20 I28 J20 J24 J45 C10 |
| Date: | 2022 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_9681&r= |
| By: | Pushkar Maitra (Department of Economics, Monash University); Sandip Mitra (Sampling and Official Statistics Unit, Indian Statistical Institute); Dilip Mookherjee (Department of Economics, Boston University); Sujata Visaria (Department of Economics, The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology) |
| Abstract: | We conduct a field experiment in India comparing two approaches to appointing a local commission agent to select eligible smallholder farmers for a subsidized credit program: a private trader in TRAIL, versus a political appointee in GRAIL. Although both schemes had similar loan take-up and repayments and similar treatment impacts on borrowing and farm output, only TRAIL raised farm profits significantly. This cannot be explained by greater connectedness between TRAIL agents and farmers, or differential patterns of borrower selection. Instead, TRAIL agents increased their interactions with treated farmers, and we argue this helped them procure inputs at lower prices. |
| Keywords: | Targeting, Intermediation, Decentralization, Community Driven Development, Agricultural Credit, Networks |
| JEL: | H42 I38 O13 O16 O17 |
| Date: | 2021–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hke:wpaper:wp2021-05&r= |
| By: | Anik Ashraf |
| Abstract: | Performance ranks introduce a trade-off for workers. They have to choose between signaling high productivity or signaling social compatibility to peers. Using a long-term experiment at a sweater factory, this paper disentangles the incentives underlying performance ranks. Treated workers receive either private or public ranks. In response, intrinsic incentives from private ranks do not affect productivity. But publicly-ranked workers reduce productivity to conform to their social groups in the workplace. Additionally, cooperation decreases among the workers, although with limited effect on productivity. The paper shows how inducing competition among workers may be counterproductive for firms. |
| Keywords: | ranks, social conformity, cooperation |
| JEL: | D23 J53 O15 |
| Date: | 2022 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:ces:ceswps:_9591&r= |
| By: | Breitmoser, Yves (Center for Mathematical Economics, Bielefeld University); Vorjohann, Pauline (Center for Mathematical Economics, Bielefeld University) |
| Abstract: | Why do people give when asked, but prefer not to be asked, and even take when possible? We introduce a novel analytical framework that allows us to express context dependence and narrow bracketing axiomatically. We then derive the utility representation of distributive preferences additionally obeying standard axioms such as separability and scaling invariance. Such pref- erences admit a generalized prospect-theoretical utility representation reminiscent of fairness- based altruism. As in prospect theory, the underlying preferences are reference dependent and non-convex, which directly predicts the previously irreconcilable empirical evidence on giving, sorting, and taking. We test the model quantitatively on data from seminal experiments and observe significantly improved fit in relation to existing models, both in-sample and out-of- sample. |
| Keywords: | Social preferences, axiomatic foundation, robustness, giving, charitable donations |
| Date: | 2022–05–13 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bie:wpaper:666&r= |
| By: | Thomas Hagedorn (Institute of Transport Economics, Muenster); Jan Wessel (Institute of Transport Economics, Muenster) |
| Abstract: | Based on a discrete choice experiment with 306 individuals from Germany, we examine the impact of the emissions-per-Euro-spent indicator (g/€ indicator) on people's travel behavior. This indicator, which was motivated by Hagedorn and Sieg (2019), makes cheap, but emission-intensive travel alternatives appear particularly harmful for the environment. We find that the g/€ indicator induces people to be more likely to choose the travel alternative with the lower indicator value. This effect persists even if participants are informed about general CO2 emissions. We also find that the steering effect of the g/€ indicator is stronger than for other emission indicators, especially for the costs of offsetting emissions. Our results thereby indicate that the g/€ indicator could be used as an effective steering instrument for people to rethink traveling with cheap, but emission-intensive means of transport, especially with ultra-low cost carriers. |
| Keywords: | Environmental metrics, g/€ indicator, discrete choice experiment, travel decisions, carbon dioxide emissions |
| JEL: | C35 Q50 R40 |
| Date: | 2022–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:mut:wpaper:35&r= |
| By: | Velvart, Joëlle (University of Basel); Dato, Prudence (University of Basel); Kuhlmey, Florian (University of Basel) |
| Abstract: | Major life decisions such as the choice of housing and its characteristics have significant implications for a household and its energy consumption because they alter structural aspects of energy demand. Energy policy interventions targeting these decisions can therefore have a long-lasting impact. To assess non-monetary policy instruments as incentives for energy-conserving housing choices we implement a discrete choice experiment with a representative sample of Swiss households. The purpose of this paper is the investigation of behavioural differences across households in reaction to social norms and energy-related information. To this end, we distinguish different types of households with a segmentation approach useful for policy makers. Our study provides insights for the question whether the tailoring of non-monetary measures can contribute to a more effective policy design compared to a one-size-fits-all approach. Estimating panel mixed logit models, we find treatment effects to significantly differ across household segments as well as with the baseline energy consumption. The evident treatment heterogeneity suggests a targeted approach for non-monetary interventions. |
| Keywords: | Housing choice, household heterogeneity, non-monetary incentives, social norms, energy literacy |
| JEL: | D1 D83 D9 Q4 Q5 R21 |
| Date: | 2022–02–17 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:bsl:wpaper:2022/03&r= |
| By: | Suparee Boonmanunt; Wasinee Jantorn; Varunee Khruapradit; Weerachart Kilenthong |
| Abstract: | This study investigates the association between child and caregiver time preferences in rural Thailand. We find that caregiver discount factor is positively correlated to a child’s ability to delay gratification, indicating that patient children are more likely to have patient caregivers. This correlation exists regardless of whether the caregiver is a biological parent or not. However, some evidence suggests genetic contribution in intergenerational transmission of time preferences: this correlation is stronger when both biological parents live at home than when none is present, and mother’s time preferences is stronger correlated with child time preferences than grandmother’s. |
| Keywords: | Time preferences; Field experiment; Intergenerational transmission; Skill formation; Genetics |
| JEL: | C93 D64 J24 O15 |
| Date: | 2022–05 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:pui:dpaper:178&r= |