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Responsibility-Alleviation and Other-Regarding Preferences with Peer Workers in Labor Markets: An Experimental Investigation

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  • Mark Owens

Abstract

A peer worker is introduced in a controlled labor market experiment characterized by unobservable effort and incomplete contracts. Workers make decisions independently and without knowledge of each other’s actions in a modified gift exchange experiment. Introducing a peer worker into an ongoing market has a negative and significant effect on effort. This decrease in effort is consistent with responsibility-alleviation on the part of employees and not with other-regarding equity concerns for the manager’s payoffs. Copyright Springer Science+Business Media, LLC 2012

Suggested Citation

  • Mark Owens, 2012. "Responsibility-Alleviation and Other-Regarding Preferences with Peer Workers in Labor Markets: An Experimental Investigation," Journal of Labor Research, Springer, vol. 33(3), pages 353-369, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:jlabre:v:33:y:2012:i:3:p:353-369
    DOI: 10.1007/s12122-012-9138-9
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Aurélie BONEIN, 2014. "Social Comparison and Peer effects with Heterogeneous Ability," Economics Working Paper Archive (University of Rennes 1 & University of Caen) 201411, Center for Research in Economics and Management (CREM), University of Rennes 1, University of Caen and CNRS.
    2. Yingchao Zhang & Oliver Fabel & Christian Thomann, 2015. "Pay inequity effects on back-office employees’ job performances: the case of a large insurance firm," Central European Journal of Operations Research, Springer;Slovak Society for Operations Research;Hungarian Operational Research Society;Czech Society for Operations Research;Österr. Gesellschaft für Operations Research (ÖGOR);Slovenian Society Informatika - Section for Operational Research;Croatian Operational Research Society, vol. 23(2), pages 421-439, June.
    3. Girtz, Robert & Hill, Joshua & Owens, Mark, 2017. "Risk preferences, responsibility, and self-monitoring in a Stag Hunt," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 68(C), pages 53-61.
    4. van den Akker, Olmo R. & van Assen, Marcel A.L.M. & van Vugt, Mark & Wicherts, Jelte M., 2020. "Sex differences in trust and trustworthiness: A meta-analysis of the trust game and the gift-exchange game," Journal of Economic Psychology, Elsevier, vol. 81(C).
    5. Burhan, Nik Ahmad Sufian & Sidek, Abdul Halim & Kurniawan, Yohan & Mohamad, Mohd Rosli, 2014. "Has Globalization Triggered Collective Impact of National Intelligence on Economic Growth?," MPRA Paper 77316, University Library of Munich, Germany.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    Peer effects; Responsibility-alleviation; Other-regarding behavior; Gift exchange; Experiment; D03; C91;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • D03 - Microeconomics - - General - - - Behavioral Microeconomics: Underlying Principles
    • C91 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Individual Behavior

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