Does gender matter for demand revelation in threshold public goods experiments?

Abstract

We examine the effect of gender on real and hypothetical contributions in a threshold public goods experiment using heterogeneous induced-values approach. Our analysis of the experimental data leads to several findings. First, gender differences in contributions are found for hypothetical payments, but not for real payments. This result is obtained while controlling for subjects' true values (induced-values) as well as socio-economic variables. Second, females are more likely to truthfully reveal their true value than males for hypothetical payments, but this effect is not significant for real payments. One could interpret these results as suggesting that females are more likely to state their value through hypothetical payments.Contingent valuation