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Charles Bellemare, Sabine Kroger

Cited by*: 0 Downloads*: 5

This paper analyzes data for a random sample drawn from the Dutch population who reveal their capacity to provide and sustain social capital by their propensity to invest and reward investments by means of an economic experiment. We have three main results. First, we find that heterogeneity in behavior is characterized by several asymmetries men, the young and elderly, and low educated individuals invest relatively less, but reward significantly more investments. Second, higher expected levels of investments have a positive and significant effect on the level of investments themselves, corroborating the presence of social norms. Third, we compare our results with a laboratory experiment conducted with a student sample. We find that the student sample provides a lower bound of the population level of social capital.

Charles Bellemare, Sabine Kroger, Arthur van Soest

Cited by*: 3 Downloads*: 9

We combine the choice data of proposers and responders in the ultimatum game, their expectations elicited in the form of subjective probability questions, and the choice data of proposers (dictators) in a dictator game to estimate a structural model of decision making under uncertainty. We use a large and representative sample of subjects drawn from the Dutch population. Our results indicate that there is considerable heterogeneity in preferences for equity in the population. Changes in preferences have an important impact on decisions of dictators in the dictator game and responders in the ultimatum game, but a smaller impact on decisions of proposers in the ultimatum game, a result due to proposers subjective expectations about responders decisions. The model which uses subjective data on expectations has better predictive power and lower noise level than a model which assumes that players have rational expectations.

Charles Bellemare

Cited by*: 5 Downloads*: 11

We present results from a field experiment testing the gift-exchange hypothesis inside a tree-planting firm paying its workforce incentive contracts. Firm managers told a crew of tree planters they would receive a pay raise for one day as a result of a surplus not attribuable to past planting productivity. We compare planter productivity - the number of trees planted per day - on the day the gift was handed out with productivity on previous and subsequent days of planting on the same block, and thus under similar planting conditions. We find direct evidence that the gift had a significant and positive effect on daily planter productivity, controlling for planter-fixed effects, weather conditions and other random daily shocks. Moreover, reciprocity is the strongest when the relationship between planters and the firm is long term.