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Full agreement and the provision of threshold public goods

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  • Federica Alberti

    (Max Planck Institute of Economics, Strategic Interaction Group, Jena)

  • Edward J. Cartwright

    (School of Economics, University of Kent, Canterbury)

Abstract

We report threshold public good experiments in which group members not only need to be individually willing to contribute enough to provide the public good but also have to agree with each other on what every group members should contribute. We find strong support to the hypothesis that full agreement increases successful provision, although it takes a few repetitions before group members can successfully coordinate. This is consistent with our theoretical results that full agreement works because it increases criticality of each individual decision. The existence of a focal point makes it possible for the group members to successfully coordinate.

Suggested Citation

  • Federica Alberti & Edward J. Cartwright, 2012. "Full agreement and the provision of threshold public goods," Jena Economics Research Papers 2011-063, Friedrich-Schiller-University Jena.
    • Handle: RePEc:jrp:jrpwrp:2011-063
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    Cited by:

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    3. Doruk İriş & Jungmin Lee & Alessandro Tavoni, 2015. "Delegation and public pressure in a threshold public goods game: theory and experimental evidence," GRI Working Papers 186, Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment.
    4. Matteo M. Marini & Aurora García-Gallego & Luca Corazzini, 2018. "Communication in a threshold public goods game with ambiguity: Anomalies and regularities," Working Papers 2018/03, Economics Department, Universitat Jaume I, Castellón (Spain).
    5. Bouma, J.A. & Nguyen, Binh & van der Heijden, Eline & Dijk, J.J., 2018. "Analysing Group Contract Design Using a Lab and a Lab-in-the-Field Threshold Public Good Experiment," Discussion Paper 2018-049, Tilburg University, Center for Economic Research.
    6. Gans, Joshua S. & Landry, Peter, 2022. "I’m not sure what to think about them: Confronting naive present bias in a dynamic threshold public goods game," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 197(C), pages 195-204.
    7. Feige, Christian & Ehrhart, Karl-Martin, 2015. "Voting and transfer payments in a threshold public goods game," Working Paper Series in Economics 73, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT), Department of Economics and Management.
    8. Federica Alberti & Anna Cartwright & Edward Cartwright, 2021. "Predicting Efficiency in Threshold Public Good Games: A Learning Direction Theory Approach," Working Papers in Economics & Finance 2021-01, University of Portsmouth, Portsmouth Business School, Economics and Finance Subject Group.
    9. Zhi Li & Dongsheng Chen & Pengfei Liu, 2023. "Assurance payments on the coordination of threshold public goods provision: An experimental investigation," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 25(2), pages 407-436, April.
    10. Xinmiao An & Yali Dong & Xiaomin Wang & Boyu Zhang, 2023. "Cooperation and Coordination in Threshold Public Goods Games with Asymmetric Players," Games, MDPI, vol. 14(6), pages 1-13, December.
    11. Marco Catola & Pietro Guarnieri & Veronica Pizziol & Chiara Rapallini, 2023. "Measuring the attitude towards a European public budget: A cross-country experiment," Discussion Papers 2023/300, Dipartimento di Economia e Management (DEM), University of Pisa, Pisa, Italy.
    12. Christian Feige & Karl-Martin Ehrhart & Jan Krämer, 2018. "Climate Negotiations in the Lab: A Threshold Public Goods Game with Heterogeneous Contributions Costs and Non-binding Voting," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 70(2), pages 343-362, June.
    13. Edward Cartwright & Anna Stepanova, 2017. "Efficiency in a forced contribution threshold public good game," International Journal of Game Theory, Springer;Game Theory Society, vol. 46(4), pages 1163-1191, November.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Public good; threshold; full agreement; focal point; experiment; coordination;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C72 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Game Theory and Bargaining Theory - - - Noncooperative Games
    • H41 - Public Economics - - Publicly Provided Goods - - - Public Goods

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