Are some people more equal than others?

• Verfasst von: Lustenhouwer, Joep [VerfasserIn]
• Verfasst von: Makarewicz, Tomasz [VerfasserIn]
• Verfasst von: Peña, Juan Carlos [VerfasserIn]
• Verfasst von: Proano, Christian [VerfasserIn]
• Titel: Are some people more equal than others?
• Titelzusatz: experimental evidence on group identity and income inequality
• Verf.angabe: Joep Lustenhouwer, Tomasz Makarewicz, Juan Carlos Peña and Christian R. Proaño
• Verlagsort: Bamberg
• Verlag: Bamberg Economic Research Group, Bamberg University
• E-Jahr: 2021
• Jahr: February 2021
• Umfang: 1 Online-Ressource (circa 70 Seiten)
• Illustrationen: Illustrationen
• Gesamttitel/Reihe: BERG working paper series ; no. 168 (February 2021)
• ISBN: 978-3-943153-89-7
• Datenträger: Online-Ressource
• Sprache: eng
• Sach-SW: Income Inequality
• Sach-SW: Political Polarization
• Sach-SW: Migration
• Sach-SW: Economic Voting Behavior
• Sach-SW: Group Identity
• Form-SW: Graue Literatur
• K10plus-PPN: 1749516934

Abstract

We investigate the effects of group identity and income inequality on social preferences and polarization by means of a laboratory experiment. We split our subjects into two populations: in-group (representing "natives") and out-group ("migrants"). In-group subjects repeatedly vote whether an unemployment insurance should cover all, some, or no members of their group. By means of a two-by-two design we disentangle the effect of group identity from those of income inequality. Among others, our experiment yields the following findings: (1) subjects tend to vote for less inclusive insurance schemes when they sample a higher chance of employment; however, (2) in-group subjects with an ex ante more beneficial distribution of employment chances - relative to the out-group - are less selfish and vote for more inclusive insurance schemes; (3) ex ante more beneficial relative employment chances of in-group subjects also leads to less polarization; and (4) revelation and priming of group identity does not lead to discrimination against out-group "migrants" but, on the contrary, can lead to more compassionate and inclusive attitudes.