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

JEL-codes: D63; D90

22 pages, April 16, 2020

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