Scandinavian Working Papers in Economics
Working Papers in Economics,
University of Bergen, Department of Economics
No 3/20: Interpreting Redistribution in the Spectator Game
Ingrid Ovidia Telle () and Sigve Tjøtta ()
Additional contact information
Ingrid Ovidia Telle: University of Bergen, Postal: Institutt for sammenlignende politikk, Universitetet i Bergen, Postboks 7802, 5020 Bergen, Norway
Sigve Tjøtta: University of Bergen, Department of Economics, Postal: Institutt for økonomi, Universitetet i Bergen, Postboks 7802, 5020 Bergen, Norway
Abstract: Spectators act as a third party, and their decisions affect the payoff for other subjects but not for themselves; there is no trade-off between “one’s own” and “others’” payoff. This feature has caused spectator design to emerge as tool to measure spectators’ inequality preferences as redistribution among “others.” Here, we conducted a spectator experiment in which we fixed the redistribution choice set and varied the salience of the “no distribution” choice. We found a strong effect from this; in the more salience treatment, the inequality that the spectators implemented increased from medium, at 0.34, to very high, at 0.62. After the spectators made their redistribution choice, we asked them what motivated their choice. Analyzing the answers gave support that non-distributive norms matters in the spectator situations.
Keywords: Spectator game; measurement of inequality; salience; exit option
22 pages, April 16, 2020
Full text files
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