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Real wealth and experimental cooperation: Evidence from field experiments

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  • Juan-Camilo Cardenas

Abstract

This paper explores how wealth and inequality can affect self-governed solutions to commons dilemmas by constraining group cooperation. It reports a series of experiments in the field where subjects are actual commons users. Household data about the participants? context explain statistically the usually observed wide variation found within and across groups in similar experiments. Participants wealth and inequality reduced cooperation when groups were allowed to have face-toface communication between rounds. There are implications for a greater awareness of nonpayoff asymmetries affecting cooperation in heterogeneous groups, apart from heterogeneity in the payoffs structure of the game.

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  • Juan-Camilo Cardenas, 2002. "Real wealth and experimental cooperation: Evidence from field experiments," Artefactual Field Experiments 00019, The Field Experiments Website.
    • Handle: RePEc:feb:artefa:00019
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    Cited by:

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    2. A. Abigail Payne & Justin Smith, 2015. "Does income inequality increase charitable giving?," Canadian Journal of Economics/Revue canadienne d'économique, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 48(2), pages 793-818, May.
    3. Levitt, Steven D. & List, John A., 2009. "Field experiments in economics: The past, the present, and the future," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 53(1), pages 1-18, January.
    4. List John A., 2007. "Field Experiments: A Bridge between Lab and Naturally Occurring Data," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 5(2), pages 1-47, April.
    5. Antonio Filippin & Manuela Raimondi, 2016. "The Patron Game with Heterogeneous Endowments: A Case Against Inequality Aversion," De Economist, Springer, vol. 164(1), pages 69-81, March.
    6. Marchiori, Carmen, 2014. "Inequality and rules in the governance of water resources," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 105(C), pages 124-129.

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