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on Social Norms and Social Capital |
| By: | Chung Wing Tse, Jianwen Wei, Yihan Wang |
| Abstract: | Social capital can help reduce adverse shocks by facilitating access to transfers and remittances.This study examines how various measures of social capital are associated with disaster recovery after the 2008 Sichuan earthquake. We find that households having a larger Spring Festival network in 2008 do better in housing reconstruction. A larger network significantly increases the amount of government aid received for housing reconstruction. Furthermore, households having larger networks receive monetary and material support from more people, which also explains the positive impacts on recovery from the earthquake. As for other measures of social capital, connections with government officials and communist party membership do not significantly contribute to disaster recovery. Human capital, measured by the years of schooling of household head, is not positively correlated with housing reconstruction. |
| Keywords: | natural disasters, social capital, Sichuan |
| JEL: | Q54 H84 |
| Date: | 2013–09 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:cgd:wpaper:344&r=soc |
| By: | Bursian, Dirk; Weichenrieder, Alfons J.; Zimmer, Jochen |
| Abstract: | The paper looks at the determinants of fiscal adjustments as reflected in the primary surplus of countries. Our conjecture is that governments will usually find it more attractive to pursue fiscal adjustments in a situation of relatively high growth, but based on a simple stylized model of government behavior the expectation is that mainly high trust governments will be in a position to defer consolidation to years with higher growth. Overall, our analysis of a panel of European countries provides support for this expectation. The difference in fiscal policies depending on government trust levels may help explaining why better governed countries have been found to have less severe business cycles. It suggests that trust and credibility play an important role not only in monetary policy, but also in fiscal policy. -- |
| Keywords: | trust,debt sustainability,fiscal reaction function,euro area,EU |
| JEL: | H62 E62 |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:safewp:22&r=soc |
| By: | Bursian, Dirk; Faia, Ester |
| Abstract: | Trust in policy makers uctuates signi cantly over the cycle and a¤ects the transmission mechanism. Despite this it is absent from the literature. We build a monetary model embedding trust cycles; the latter emerge as an equilibrium phenomenon of a game-theoretic interaction between atomistic agents and the monetary authority. Trust a¤ects agentsstochastic discount factors, namely the price of future risk, and through this it interacts with the monetary trans- mission mechanism. Using data from the Eurobarometer surveys we analyze the link between trust and the transmission mechanism of macro and monetary shocks: empirical results are in line with theoretical ones. -- |
| Keywords: | trust evolutionary games,trust driven expectations,monetary transmission mechanism |
| JEL: | E0 E5 |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:safewp:14&r=soc |
| By: | Bursian, Dirk; Fürth, Sven |
| Abstract: | In the aftermath of the financial crisis, the ECB has experienced an unprecedented deterioration in the level of trust. This raises the question as to what factors determine trust in central banking. We use a unique cross-country dataset which includes a rich set of socio-economic characteristics and supplement it with variables meant to reflect a country's macroeconomic condition. We find that besides individual socio-economic characteristics, macroeconomic conditions play a crucial role in the trust-building process. Our results suggest that agents are boundedly rational in the trust-building process and that current ECB market operations may even be beneficial for trust in the ECB in the long-run. -- |
| Keywords: | Central Banking,European Central Bank,Financial Crisis,Fiscal Crisis,Trust |
| JEL: | D1 E5 G21 H6 |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:safewp:31&r=soc |
| By: | Georgarakos, Dimitris; Haliassos, Michalis; Pasini, Giacomo |
| Abstract: | Debt-induced crises, including the subprime, are usually attributed exclusively to supply-side factors. We uncover an additional factor contributing to debt culture, namely social influences emanating from the perceived average income of peers. Using unique information from a representative household survey of the Dutch population that circumvents the need to define the social circle, we consider collateralized, consumer, and informal loans. We find robust social effects on borrowing - especially among those who consider themselves poorer than their peers - and on indebtedness, suggesting a link to financial distress. We check the robustness of our results using several approaches to rule out spurious associations and handle correlated effects. -- |
| Keywords: | Household finance,household debt,social interactions,mortgages,consumer credit,informal loans |
| JEL: | G11 E21 |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:zbw:safewp:1&r=soc |
| By: | Fabrizio Adriani (Department of Economics, University of Leicester); Silvia Sonderegger (School of Economics, University of Nottingham) |
| Abstract: | We consider a society with informed individuals (adults) and naive individuals (children). Adults are altruistic towards their own children and possess information that allows to better predict the behavior of other adults. Children benefit from adopting behaviors that conform to the social norm determined by aggregate adult behavior, but, lacking accurate information, have to rely on the observed behavior of their adult parent to infer the norm. We show that this causes a signaling distortion in adult behavior. Compared to the benchmark case of no signaling, parents have a higher propensity to adopt attitudes that encourage their children to behave in a socially safe way, i.e. the way which would be optimal under maximum uncertainty about the prevailing social norm. This distortion is different in nature from the typical distortion due to a conflict of interest between sender and receiver in standard signaling games. The norm-signaling bias is self-reinforcing and might lead both to (Pareto) superior and inferior outcomes relative to the case of no signaling. We discuss applications to sexual attitudes, collective reputation, and trust. |
| Keywords: | Signaling, Norms, Strategic Uncertainty, Complementarities, Coordination Games, Socialization. |
| Date: | 2013–11 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:not:notcdx:2013-11&r=soc |
| By: | Aggarwal, Raj (University of Akron); Goodell, John (University of Akron) |
| Abstract: | The preference of microfinance institutions for women borrowers is generally attributed to two reasons: women borrowers are more trustworthy and have greater social impact. However, the role of social trust with regard to this gender preference has not been adequately investigated. Controlling for the social outreach goals of MFIs, we document that MFIs favor women more in low trust countries, suggesting that women are targeted to offset low social trust. We also examine how the nature of trust formation affects this relationship between gender targeting and trust. Our results should be of considerable interest to policymakers and scholars. |
| JEL: | A14 G21 J16 J30 O16 |
| Date: | 2013–12–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:fip:fedcwp:1317&r=soc |
| By: | Yann Rébillé (LEMNA - Laboratoire d'économie et de management de Nantes Atlantique - Université de Nantes : EA4272); Lionel Richefort (LEMNA - Laboratoire d'économie et de management de Nantes Atlantique - Université de Nantes : EA4272) |
| Abstract: | We model agents in a network game of strategic complements and negative externalities. Sufficient conditions for the existence of a unique Nash equilibrium and of a unique social optimum are established. Under these conditions, we find that players with more vulnerable locations in the network exert more effort at equilibrium, and that the most influential players should exert less effort at efficiency. We then find structural conditions under which each player exerts strictly more effort than her efficient level, whether the social optimum be interior or not. |
| Keywords: | Network; strategic complements; equilibrium; efficiency; social tragedy. |
| Date: | 2014–01–06 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:hal:wpaper:hal-00924017&r=soc |
| By: | Irenaeus Wolff |
| Abstract: | To understand cooperative behaviour in social-dilemma experiments, we need to understand the game participants play not only in monetary but in preference terms. Does a Nash-prediction based on participants' actual preferences describe their behaviour in a public-good experiment well? And if not, where does the observed behaviour diverge from the prediction? This study provides an environment which allows to answer these questions: when making their contribution decision, participants are informed about their co-playersÕ priorly-elicited conditional contribution preferences. This induces common knowledge of preferences and thereby leads to direct experimental control over the game participants play. Results show that most people play best-responses to their beliefs. At the same time, beliefs in a third of the cases do not correspond to an equilibrium prediction that is based on the elicited conditional-cooperation preferences. Moreover, more often than not, beliefs are empirically inaccurate. This holds true even in a treatment that gives participants the option to look up the set of equilibria of their game. |
| Keywords: | Public good, social dilemma, Nash-equilibrium, rational beliefs, conditional cooperation, social preferences. |
| Date: | 2013 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:twi:respas:0088&r=soc |
| By: | Benjamin Elsner (Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA)); Gaia Narciso (Trinity College Dublin); Jacco J. J. � Thijssen (University of York) |
| Abstract: | Diaspora networks provide information to future migrants and influence both their decision to migrate and their success in the host country. While the existing literature explains the effect of networks on migration decisions through the size of the migrant community, we show that the quality of the network is an equally important determinant. We argue that networks that are more integrated in the society of the host country can give more accurate information about job prospects to future migrants. In a decision model with imperfect signalling we show that migrants with access to a better network are more likely to make the right decision - they migrate only if they gain - and they migrate earlier. We test these predictions empirically using data on recent Mexican migrants to the US, and exploit the geographic diffusion of Mexicans since the 1980s as well as the settlement of immigrants that came during the Bracero program in the 1950s to instrument for the quality of networks. The results provide strong evidence that connections to a better-integrated network lead to better outcomes after migration. Yet we find no evidence that the quality of the network affects the timing of migration. |
| JEL: | F22 J15 J61 |
| Date: | 2014–01 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:crm:wpaper:1403&r=soc |
| By: | Christophe Nordman (IRD, UMR 225 DIAL); Laure Pasquier-Doumer (IRD, UMR 225 DIAL) |
| Abstract: | (english) This paper sheds light on the role of social networks in the dynamics of a West African labour market, i.e. in the transitions from unemployment to employment, from wage employment to self-employment, and from self-employment to wage employment. It investigates the effects of three dimensions of the social network on these transitions: its structure, the strength of ties and the resources embedded in the network. For this purpose, we use a first-hand survey conducted in Ouagadougou on a representative sample of 2000 households. Using event history data and very detailed information on social networks, we estimate proportional hazard models for discrete-time data. We find that social networks have a significant effect on the dynamics of workers in the labour market and that this effect differs depending on the type of transition and the considered dimension of the social network. The network size appears to not matter much in the labour market dynamics. Strong ties however play a stabilizing role by limiting large transitions. Their negative effect on transitions is reinforced when they are combined with high level of resources embedded in the network._________________________________ (français) Dans cet article, nous analysons le rôle des réseaux sociaux dans la dynamique d'un marché du travail en Afrique de l'Ouest, en nous intéressant aux transitions du chômage vers l'emploi, de l'emploi salarié vers l’emploi indépendant et enfin de l’emploi indépendant vers l’emploi salarié. Les données d’une enquête originale que nous utilisons permettent d’appréhender les réseaux sociaux dans trois de leurs dimensions, à savoir sa structure, la force des liens et des ressources intégrées dans le réseau, et d’analyser les effets différenciés de chacune de ces dimensions sur ces transitions. Ces données, collectées à Ouagadougou en 2009, rassemblent les biographies professionnelles de 2000 ménages et sont représentatives à l’échelle de la ville. En nous appuyant sur des modèles de risques proportionnels, nous constatons que les réseaux sociaux ont un effet significatif sur la dynamique des travailleurs et que cet effet diffère selon le type de transition et la dimension considérée du réseau social. La taille du réseau semble joué un rôle mineur au regard des deux autres dimensions. Des liens forts jouent un rôle stabilisateur en limitant les grandes transitions. Leur effet négatif sur les transitions est renforcé quand ces liens forts sont combinés à un niveau élevé de ressources du réseau. |
| Keywords: | Social Network, Kinship, Labour Market Dynamics, Event History Data, Survival Analysis, Burkina Faso, Réseaux sociaux, parentèle, dynamique du marché du travail, enquête biographique, modèle de durée, Burkina Faso. |
| JEL: | D13 J24 L14 |
| Date: | 2013–10 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:dia:wpaper:dt201312&r=soc |
| By: | McGregor, Elaine (UNU-MERIT / MGSoG); Siegel, Melissa (UNU-MERIT / MGSoG) |
| Abstract: | The use of internet technologies in daily life has risen dramatically in recent years, increasing researchers' interest in how social media such as Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn are changing social realities and potentially facilitating innovative research methodologies. As technology and migration are considered prominent drivers of the globalization processes, the increasing interest of migration researchers is unsurprising. Nevertheless, given the relative youth of research in this field, approaches to the topic differ. By taking a step back and viewing the literature from a wide range of disciplines, this paper provides a broad overview of the current state of research on migration and social media in four key areas: 1) the use of social media to trigger and facilitate migration in both positive (networks) and negative ways (human trafficking); 2) the role of social media and migrant integration; 3) the use of social media in diaspora engagement; and 4) the use of social media in conducting migration research. This paper adds to the literature by being the first systematic review of the topic. |
| Keywords: | Social Media, Migration Research, Social Networking Sites, Diaspora Engagement, Integration, Facilitation of Migration |
| JEL: | F22 O15 O33 L86 L82 Q55 |
| Date: | 2013–12–31 |
| URL: | http://d.repec.org/n?u=RePEc:unm:unumer:2013068&r=soc |