Hostname: page-component-5f56664f6-6m42z Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2025-05-07T07:22:52.435Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The impact of endowment heterogeneity and origin on contributions in best-shot public good games

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 March 2025

Stephan Kroll ,
Todd L. Cherry  and
Jason F. Shogren
Stephan Kroll*
Affiliation:
Department of Economics, California State University, Sacramento, 6000 J-Street, Sacramento, CA 95819-6082; Center for Experimental Economics, University of Innsbruck, Universitätsstr. 15, A-6020 Innsbruck, Austria
Todd L. Cherry
Affiliation:
Department of Economics, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, Tennessee 37996-0550
Jason F. Shogren
Affiliation:
Department of Economics and Finance, University of Wyoming, Laramie, WY 82071-3985
*
e-mail: [email protected]
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Economists and psychologists have long argued the origin of wealth influences individual behavior. In a previous study (Cherry et al., 2005), we found the origin of endowment did not significantly affect behavior in linear public good games with summation contribution technology. In such games, however, both Nash behavior (everybody gives nothing) and social optimal behavior (everybody gives the entire endowment) call for symmetric levels of contributions. Results from this new study indicate that the origin of wealth might matter in more asymmetric situations, such as in a best-shot public good game with heterogeneous groups.

Keywords

Endowment heterogeneityEndowment originBest-shot public good experiment

JEL classification

H41: Public Goods C92: Laboratory, Group Behavior C72: Noncooperative Games
Type
Research Article
Information
Experimental Economics , Volume 10 , Issue 4 , December 2007 , pp. 411 - 428
Copyright
Copyright © 2007 Economic Science Association

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

Footnotes

Electronic Supplementary Material Supplementary material is available in the online version of this article at http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s10683-006-9144-y.

References

Andreoni, J. (2006). Leadership giving in charitable fund-raising. Journal of Public Economic Theory, 8, 1–22.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Andreoni, J., Brown, P. M., & Vesterlund, L. (2002). What makes an allocation fair? Some experimental evidence. Games and Economic Behavior, 40, 1–24.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Arkes, H. R., Joyner, C. A., Pezzo, M. V., Nash, J. G., Siegel-Jacobs, K., & Stone, E. (1994). The psychology of windfall gains. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 59, 331–347.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ball, S., Eckel, C., Grossman, P., & Zame, W. (2001). Status in markets. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 116, 495–514.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bilodeau, M., Childs, J., & Mestelman, S. (2004). Volunteering a public service: An experimental investigation. Journal of Public Economics, 88, 2839–2855.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bilodeau, M., & Slivinski, A. (1996). Toilet cleaning and department chairing: volunteering a public service. Journal of Public Economics, 59, 299–308.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bliss, C., & Nalebuff, B. (1984). Dragon-slaying and ballroom dancing: The private supply of a public good. Journal of Public Economic Economics, 25, 1–12.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Bolton, G., & Ockenfels, A. (2000). ERC: A theory of equity, reciprocity, and competition. American Economic Review, 90, 166–193.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Camerer, C. (2003). Behavioral game theory: Experiments in strategic interaction. Princeton: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Carpenter, J. (2002). Information, fairness, and reciprocity in the best shot game. Economics Letters, 75, 243–248.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Carpenter, J. (2005). Endogenous social preferences. Review of Radical Political Economics, 37, 63–84.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Charness, G., & Rabin, M. (2002). Understanding social preferences with simple tests. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 117, 817–869.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cherry, T. L., Frykblom, P., & Shogren, J. F. (2002). Hardnose the dictator. American Economic Review, 92, 1218–1221.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cherry, T. L., Kroll, S., & Shogren, J. F. (2005). The impact of endowment heterogeneity and origin on public good contributions. Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, 57, 357–365.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Chmura, T., Kube, S., Pitz, T., & Puppe, C. (2005). “Testing (beliefs about) social preferences: Evidence from an experimental coordination game. Economics Letters, 88, 214–220.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Clark, J. (1998). Fairness in public good provision: An investigation of preferences for equality and proportionality. Canadian Journal of Economics, 31, 708–729.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Clark, J. (2002). House money effects in public good experiments. Experimental Economics, 5, 223–231.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cornes, R. (1993). Dyke maintenance and other stories: Some neglected types of public goods. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 108, 259–271.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Cummings, R. G., & Taylor, L. O. (1999). Unbiased value estimates for environmental goods: A cheap talk design for the contingent valuation method. American Economic Review, 89, 649–665.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Dayton-Johnson, J., & Bardhan, P. (2002). Inequality and conservation on the local commons: A theoretical exercise. Economic Journal, 112, 577–602.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Engelmann, D., & Strobel, M. (2004). Inequality aversion, efficiency, and maximin preferences in simple distribution experiments. American Economics Review, 94, 857–869.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fahr, R., & Irlenbusch, B. (2000). Fairness as a constraint on trust in reciprocity: Earned property rights in a reciprocal exchange experiment. Economics Letters, 66, 275–282.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Falk, A., Fehr, E., & Fischbacher, U. (2003). On the nature of fair behavior. Economic Inquiry, 41, 20–26.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Fehr, E., Näf, M., & Schmidt, K. (forthcoming). The role of equality, efficiency and Rawlsian motives in social preferences: A reply to Engelmann and Strobel. American Economic Review.Google Scholar
Fehr, E., & Schmidt, K. (1999). A theory of fairness, competition and cooperation. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 114, 817–868.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Friedman, M. (1957). A theory of the consumption function. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Gneezy, U. (2003). Do high wages lead to high profits? An experimental study of reciprocity using real effort. Working Paper, University of Chicago Graduate School of Business.Google Scholar
Guth, W., Kliemt, H., & Ockenfels, A. (2003). Fairness versus efficiency: An experimental study of (Mutual) gift giving. Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, 50, 465–475.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Harrison, G. W., & Hirshleifer, J. (1989). An experimental evaluation of weakest link/best shot models of public goods. Journal of Public Economy, 97, 201–225.Google Scholar
Hirshleifer, J. (1983). From weakest-link to best-shot: The voluntary provision of public goods. Public Choice, 41, 371–386.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Hoffman, E., McCabe, K., & Smith, V. (1996). Social distance and other-regarding behavior in dictator games. American Economic Review, 86, 653–660.Google Scholar
Keasey, K., & Moon, P. (1996). Gambling with the house money in capital expenditure decisions. Economics Letters, 50, 105–110.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Keeler, J., James, W., & Abdel-Ghany, M. (1985). The relative size of windfall income and the permanent income hypothesis. Journal of Business and Economic Statistics, 3, 209–215.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Konow, J. (2000). “Fair Shares: Accountability and cognitive dissonance in allocation decisions.” American Economic Review. 90, 1072–1091.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Konrad, K., Künemund, H., Lommerud, K. E., & Robello, J. (2002). Geography of the family. American Economic Review, 92, 981–998.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Kritikos, A., & Bolle, F. (2001). Distributional concerns: Equity- or efficiency-oriented? Economics Letters, 73, 333–338.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
List, J. A., & Cherry, T. L. (2000). Learning to accept in ultimatum games: Evidence from an experimental design that generates low offers. Experimental Economics, 3, 11–29.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Nalley, L., Hudson, D., & Parkhurst, G. (2005). The initial endowment effect in experimental auctions revisited: Further evidence. Applied Economic Letters, 12, 59–63.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Ochs, J. (1995). Coordination problems. In Kagel, J. H. & Roth, A. E. (Eds.), Handbook of experimental economics (pp. 195–251). Princeton: Princeton University Press.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Prasnikar, V., & Roth, A. (1992). Considerations of fairness and strategy: Experimental data from sequential games. Quarterly Journal of Economics, 107, 865–888.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Rabin, M. (1993). Incorporating fairness into game theory and economics. American Economic Review, 83, 1281–1302.Google Scholar
Rutström, E. E., & Williams, M. B. (2000). Entitlements and fairness: An experimental study of distributive preferences. Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, 43, 75–89.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sandler, T. (1999). Global challenges: An approach to environmental, political, and economic problems. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Sandler, T. (2001). On financing global and international public goods. World Bank Policy Research Paper 2638.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Sandler, T. (2006). Regional public goods and international organizations. Review of International Organizations, 1, 5–27.CrossRefGoogle ScholarPubMed
Schelling, T. C. (1960). The strategy of conflict. Harvard: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Shogren, J. F. (1989). Fairness in bargaining requires a context: An experimental examination of loyalty. Economics Letters, 31, 319–323.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Shogren, J. F. (1997). Self-interest and equity in a bargaining tournament with nonlinear payoffs. Journal of Economic Behavior and Organization, 32, 383–394.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Thaler, R., & Johnson, E. (1990). Gambling with the house money and trying to break even: The effects of prior outcomes on risky choice. Management Science, 36, 643–660.CrossRefGoogle Scholar
Supplementary material: File

Kroll et al. supplementary material

Kroll et al. supplementary material 1
Download Kroll et al. supplementary material(File)
File 26.6 KB
Supplementary material: File

Kroll et al. supplementary material

Kroll et al. supplementary material 2
Download Kroll et al. supplementary material(File)
File 59.4 KB
Supplementary material: File

Kroll et al. supplementary material

Kroll et al. supplementary material 3
Download Kroll et al. supplementary material(File)
File 49.2 KB
Supplementary material: File

Kroll et al. supplementary material

Kroll et al. supplementary material 4
Download Kroll et al. supplementary material(File)
File 39.9 KB