Unequal Opportunities and Distributive Justice

We provide experimental evidence on how unequal access to performance enhancing education affects demand for redistribution. People earn money in a real effort experiment and can then decide how to distribute it among themselves and another subjects. We compare situations in which randomly chosen people get access to performance enhancing education with situations in which either only luck or only performance determines outcome. We find that unequal opportunities evoke a preference for redistribution that is comparable to the situation when luck alone determines the allocation. However, people with unequal access to education are more likely to disagree about the appropriate distribution.Distribution, Inequality of opportunities, Negotiation, Education, Experiment

Unequal Opportunities and Distributive Justice

There is well established empirical evidence that more redistribution occurs when luck rather than performance determines the earnings. We provide experimental evidence on how unequal access to performance enhancing education affects demand for redistribution. In this experiment, we can control the information about the role of luck and effort. We find that unequal opportunities evoke a preference for redistribution that is comparable to the situation when luck alone determines the allocation rather than performance. Furthermore, unequal opportunities reduce performance incentives.Distribution, Inequality of opportunities, Negotiation, Education, Experiment

Voluntary Standards and Coordination in Public Goods Games

Contributions to public goods are often unobservable. In order to make contributions visible, voluntary standards are used, which make a particular contribution level publicly observable. This paper investigates the effect of such partial information on the contributions to public goods. First, we observe that the implementation of a too low standard level leads to the lowest efficiency. Second, we find that standards function as a coordination device. Higher standards give rise to higher modal contribution but the likelihood that the standard level is reached gets lower. Third, conditional cooperation is observed in the sense that subjects are more likely to comply with the standard as the number of group members who previously complied with it is higher.publishe

Unequal Opportunities and Distributive Justice

We provide experimental evidence on how unequal access to performance enhancing education affects demand for redistribution. People earn money in a real effort experiment and can then decide how to distribute it among themselves and another subjects. We compare situations in which randomly chosen people get access to performance enhancing education with situations in which either only luck or only performance determines outcome. We find that unequal opportunities evoke a preference for redistribution that is comparable to the situation when luck alone determines the allocation. However, people with unequal access to education are more likely to disagree about the appropriate distribution

Unequal opportunities and distributive justice

There is well established empirical evidence that more redistribution occurs when luck rather than performance determines the earnings. We provide experimental evidence on how unequal access to performance enhancing education affects demand for redistribution. In this experiment, we can control the information about the role of luck and effort. We find that unequal opportunities evoke a preference for redistribution that is comparable to the situation when luck alone determines the allocation rather than performance. Furthermore, unequal opportunities reduce performance incentives

Wearing a mask - For yourself or for others? : Behavioral correlates of mask wearing among COVID-19 frontline workers

Human behavior can have effects on oneself and externalities on others. Mask wearing is such a behavior in the current pandemic. What motivates people to wear face masks in public when mask wearing is voluntary or not enforced? Which benefits should the policy makers rather emphasize in information campaigns—the reduced chances of getting the SARS-CoV-2 virus (benefits for oneself) or the reduced chances of transmitting the virus (benefits for others in the society)? In this paper, we link measured risk preferences and other-regarding preferences to mask wearing habits among 840 surveyed employees of two large Swiss hospitals. We find that the leading mask-wearing motivations change with age: While for older people, mask wearing habits are best explained by their self-regarding risk preferences, younger people are also motivated by other-regarding concerns. Our results are robust to different specifications including linear probability models, probit models and Lasso covariate selection models. Our findings thus allow drawing policy implications for effectively communicating public-health recommendations to frontline workers during the COVID-19 pandemic.publishe

Which hospital workers do (not) want the jab? Behavioral correlates of COVID-19 vaccine willingness among employees of Swiss hospitals

In many countries, the current vaccination rates are stagnating, to the extent that vaccine hesitancy-the delay or refusal to take recommended vaccinations-forms a major obstacle to ending the COVID-19 pandemic. This tendency is particularly concerning when observed among healthcare workers who are opinion leaders on medical matters for their patients and peers. Our study surveys 965 employees of two large Swiss hospitals and profiles vaccine-hesitant hospital employees using not only socio-demographic characteristics, but also a comprehensive set of standard behavioral preference measures: (i) Big-5 personality traits, (ii) risk-, time- and social preferences, and (iii) perceived prevailing social norms. Using multinomial probit models and linear probability models, we find that vaccine-hesitant hospital employees are less patient and less likely to perceive vaccination as the prevailing social norm-in addition to replicating previously published socio-demographic results. Our findings are robust to a range of model specifications, as well as individual and situational covariates. Our study thus offers actionable policy implications for tailoring public-health communications to vaccine-hesitant hospital employees

Which hospital workers do (not) want the jab? : Behavioral correlates of COVID-19 vaccine willingness among employees of Swiss hospitals

In many countries, the current vaccination rates are stagnating, to the extent that vaccine hesitancy—the delay or refusal to take recommended vaccinations—forms a major obstacle to ending the COVID-19 pandemic. This tendency is particularly concerning when observed among healthcare workers who are opinion leaders on medical matters for their patients and peers. Our study surveys 965 employees of two large Swiss hospitals and profiles vaccine-hesitant hospital employees using not only socio-demographic characteristics, but also a comprehensive set of standard behavioral preference measures: (i) Big-5 personality traits, (ii) risk-, time- and social preferences, and (iii) perceived prevailing social norms. Using multinomial probit models and linear probability models, we find that vaccine-hesitant hospital employees are less patient and less likely to perceive vaccination as the prevailing social norm—in addition to replicating previously published socio-demographic results. Our findings are robust to a range of model specifications, as well as individual and situational covariates. Our study thus offers actionable policy implications for tailoring public-health communications to vaccine-hesitant hospital employees.publishe

Wearing a mask - For yourself or for others? Behavioral correlates of mask wearing among COVID-19 frontline workers

Human behavior can have effects on oneself and externalities on others. Mask wearing is such a behavior in the current pandemic. What motivates people to wear face masks in public when mask wearing is voluntary or not enforced? Which benefits should the policy makers rather emphasize in information campaigns—the reduced chances of getting the SARS-CoV-2 virus (benefits for oneself) or the reduced chances of transmitting the virus (benefits for others in the society)? In this paper, we link measured risk preferences and other-regarding preferences to mask wearing habits among 840 surveyed employees of two large Swiss hospitals. We find that the leading mask-wearing motivations change with age: While for older people, mask wearing habits are best explained by their self-regarding risk preferences, younger people are also motivated by other-regarding concerns. Our results are robust to different specifications including linear probability models, probit models and Lasso covariate selection models. Our findings thus allow drawing policy implications for effectively communicating public-health recommendations to frontline workers during the COVID-19 pandemic