Papers - Natural

Michael Kremer, Edward Miguel

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Intestinal helminths - including hookworm, roundworm, schistosomiasis, and whipworm - infect more than one-quarter of the world's population. A randomized evaluation of a project in Kenya suggests that school-based mass treatment with deworming drugs reduced school absenteeism in treatment schools by one quarter; gains are especially large among the youngest children. Deworming is found to be cheaper than alternative ways of boosting school participation. By reducing disease transmission, deworming creates substantial externality health and school participation benefits among untreated children in the treatment schools and among children in neighboring schools. These externalities are large enough to justify fully subsidizing treatment. We do not find evidence that deworming improves academic test scores. Existing experimental studies, in which treatment is randomized among individuals in the same school, find small and insignificant deworming treatment effects on education; however, these studies underestimate true treatment effects if deworming creates positive externalities for the control group and reduces treatment group attrition.

Gerald Pruckner, Rupert Sausgruber

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A publisher uses an honor-system for selling a newspaper in the street. The customers make payments into a cash-box, but can also just take the paper without paying. Payments are not monitored and highly anonymous; hence customers exhibit trustworthiness if they pay for the paper. We run a natural field experiment to identify motives behind payments. The experiment reveals that trustworthiness is based on a social rather than a legal norm. Additional survey questions serve to identify individual-specific components of trustworthiness. We find effects of gender, age, family status, church attendance, measures of reciprocity, social connectedness, and social risk.

Erwin Bulte, John A List, Jason F Shogren

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An important public policy question that remains unresolved is whether devolution will enhance sensible policy making by exploiting informational asymmetries or, instead, trigger a "beggar thy neighbor" response and stimulate free riding amongst localities. We analyze this question within the framework of U.S. environmental policy making by scrutinizing a unique panel data set on state-level endangered species expenditure patterns. Our empirical estimates are consistent with the notion that states free ride, which may lead to an expenditure equilibrium that is not Pareto efficient.

Laura Gee, Michael Schreck

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Charitable giving has been about 2% of US GDP since the turn of the century. A popular fundraising tool is donation matching where every dollar is matched by a third party. But field experiments find that matching does not always increase donations. This may occur because individuals believe that peer donors will exhaust the matching funds. We develop a theory of how beliefs about peers' donations affect one's own likelihood of donation. We test our theory using novel "threshold match" treatments in field and laboratory experiments. These treatments form small groups and offer a flat matching bonus if a threshold number of donations is received. One "threshold match" treatment more than doubles the donation rate in the field relative to no match. To better understand the mechanism behind this huge increase, we use a lab study to replicate the field results and further show that beliefs about peers' donations matter. Our theoretical, lab, and field results combined suggest people are more likely to donate when they believe they are more pivotal to securing matching money. Beliefs about others matter, and they should be taken into account when trying to increase donations.

Niklas Bengtsson, Per Engstrom

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Results in behavioral economics suggest that material incentives can crowd out effort, if agents are mission-oriented rather than self-interested. We test this prediction on a sample of nonprofit organizations in Sweden. Swedish nonprofit organizations receive tax funds annually to promote global development issues through information campaigns. Traditionally, the contract with the main principal (the Swedish foreign aid agency) has been based on trust and self-regulation. We designed an experimental policy intervention, effectively replacing the trust-based contract with an increased level of monitoring from the principal, along with a threat to cut future funds if irregularities were detected. Our findings are inconsistent with (strong) motivational crowd-out. Overall, using both self-reported and observed measures of outreach, we find that the intervention improved efficiency. Graphical analysis shows that non-monitored organizations exhibit a distinct tendency to maximize expenditure; in contrast, organizations in the treatment group are more likely to return unused grants to Sida. Additionally, we find no crowding out of private contributions and no evidence of a "discouraged NGO"-syndrome.

Ryan D Friedrichs, David C King, David W Nickerson

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Recent large-scale field experiments of get out the vote (GOTV) drives have been non-partisan and may not accurately capture the effectiveness of partisan campaign outreach. In the 2002 Michigan gubernatorial election, a large field experiment across 14 state house districts evaluated the cost effectiveness of three mobilization technologies utilized by the Michigan Democratic Party's Youth Coordinated Campaign: door hangers, volunteer phone calls, and face-to-face visits. The results indicate that all three GOTV strategies possess similar cost-effectiveness.

Nick Drydakis

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A field experiment was contacted in order to unbiased test whether female ethnic minorities; Albanians, face housing discrimination by owners when they seek to rent a unit in Greece three years after the national adoption of the European anti-discrimination legislation. Replicated the commonest process to rent a unit in Greece; telephone contact, we investigated a big sample represented by 122 areas. Rationally classified them in three status groups, according to their average rent levels, we found that discrimination increased monotonically with areas' status. The estimated probability of Albanians to receive an invitation to investigate a unit was lower by 0.231 in low status areas, followed by 0.324 in medium status areas, and by 0.419 in high status areas than that of Greeks. Adjusted for intra-class correlation the estimated differentials were found to be statistically significant. Similarly, we estimated an insignificant rent penalty against Albanians of 0.010 in low status areas, and significant penalties of 0.015 in medium status areas and of 0.023 in high status areas against Albanians. Consequently, a taste and/or statistical discrimination implied against Albanian seekers. Interestingly, the study enabled to estimate further that good rental housings are in significant degree unavailable to Albanians restricted their freedom in selecting a place to live. Specifically, Albanian seekers faced significantly less probabilities to investigate newer, busheled and units placed in floor than Greeks. Whilst, Albanians in order to have access to good units they had to pay more than Greeks. Finally, we estimated that female owners practiced significantly more availability constraints to Albanians than male owners. The current research contributes to two areas that have attracted scarce research attention in Greece: the experimental investigation of housing discrimination and discrimination by ethnicity. The results of this study have implications for understanding some of the enduring patterns of ethnic discrimination in the housing market.

Uri Gneezy, Kenneth Leonard, John A List

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This study uses a controlled experiment to explore whether there are gender differences in selecting into competitive environments across two distinct societies: the Maasai in Tanzania and the Khasi in India. One unique aspect of these societies is that the Maasai represent a textbook example of a patriarchal society whereas the Khasi are matrilineal. Similar to the extant evidence drawn from experiments executed in Western cultures, Maasai men opt to compete at roughly twice the rate as Maasai women. Interestingly, this result is reversed amongst the Khasi, where women choose the competitive environment more often than Khasi men, and even choose to compete weakly more often than Maasai men. We view these results as potentially providing insights into the underpinnings of the factors hypothesized to be determinants of the observed gender differences in selecting into competitive environments.

Melissa R Michelson, Herbert Villa Jr.

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Less than a third of Latinos vote in Presidential elections, while less than one fourth participate in Congressional elections. Turnout among young Latinos (age 18-25) is even lower. This paper describes the results of a field experiment aimed at increasing turnout among young Latinos in Fresno, California conducted in the fall of 2002. Canvassers went door-to-door during the final two weekends before Election Day to urge registered young people to go to the polls. Young people of all races/ethnicities were targeted. In addition to testing the effectiveness of personal contact and how this varies among registered voters of various races/ ethnicities, the project also included two imbedded experiments. First, the race/ethnicity of the canvassers was randomly assigned, to test whether Latinos and non-Latinos are equally effective at getting Latinos and non- Latinos to the polls. Second, the message delivered to contacted registered voters was randomly assigned, to test whether young Latinos are more receptive to a message which stresses group solidarity or one that emphasizes civic duty. The experiment demonstrates that Latino canvassers are better than non-Latinos at contacting young Latino voters, and that young Latinos are more receptive than are non-Latinos to door-todoor mobilization efforts.

Pablo Celhay, Paul Gertler, Paula Giavagnoli, Christel Vermeersch

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We show that fixed costs of adjustment as opposed to low returns likely explain why better quality care practices diffuse slowly in the medical industry. Using a randomized field experiment conducted in Argentina, we find that temporary financial incentives paid to health clinics for the early initiation of prenatal care 'nudged' providers to test and develop new data driven strategies to locate and encourage likely pregnant women to seek care in the first trimester of pregnancy. These innovations raised the rate of early initiation of prenatal care by 34% while the incentives were being paid in the treatment period. We follow health clinics over time and find that this increase persisted for at least 24 months after the incentives ended. In the absence of incentives, even though it is in the clinics' interest to stimulate early initiation of care, the presence of hard to change habits and cost of experimentation made it too expensive to develop and implement new methods to increase early initiation of care. Despite the large increases in early initiation of prenatal care, we find no effects on health outcomes.

Stephan Meier

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Subsidizing charitable giving-for example, for victims of natural disasters-is very popular, not only with governments but also with private organizations. Many companies match their employees' charitable contributions, hoping that this will foster the willingness to contribute. However, systematic analyses of the effect of such a matching mechanism are still lacking. This article tests the effect of matching charitable giving in a randomized field experiment in the short and the long run. The donations of a randomly selected group were matched by contributions from an anonymous donor. The results support the hypothesis that a matching mechanism increases contributions to a public good. However, in the periods after the experiment, when matching donations have been stopped, the contribution rate declines for the treatment group. The matching mechanism leads to a negative net effect on the participation rate. The field experiment therefore provides evidence suggesting that the willingness to contribute may be undermined by a matching mechanism in the long run.

Richard Martin, John Randal

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We describe a natural field experiment investigating donation behaviour. The setting was an art gallery where donations could be deposited into a transparent box in the foyer. Two aspects of the donation environment were manipulated: signs on the donation box and the initial contents of the box. We used three sign treatments: a control with no sign, a sign that thanked donors, and a sign that indicated donations would be matched. We used two initial contents treatments: one with relatively little money ($50) and one with four times as much. The average donation per donor was significantly larger in the $200 treatments but this was offset by a decrease in the propensity to donate. In the matching treatments donations were significantly larger both at the per donor and per visitor level. A control donate variable turned out to have the largest influence on donation behaviour: the day of the week. The average donation per visitor was 51% higher on Sundays, when compared to every other day of the week.

Anya Samek

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The gender difference in competitiveness has been cited as an important factor driving the gender gap in labor market outcomes. Using a natural field experiment with 35,000 university students, I explore the impact of compensation scheme on willingness to apply for a job. I find that competitive compensation schemes disproportionately deter women from applying, which cannot be explained by differences in risk preferences alone. I also vary whether the job is introduced as helping a non-profit, which increases application rates, suggesting a role for social preferences in application decisions. Finally, I observe a correlation between competitiveness preferences and career choice.

Richard Damania, Per Fredriksson , John A List

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This study uses a three-stage common agency model to explore the linkages between trade policy, corruption and environmental policy in an imperfect market setting. We show that the effect of trade liberalization on the stringency of environmental policy depends critically on the level of corruption-in relatively corrupt countries, trade openness leads to more stringent environmental policy. In such countries, this interaction, therefore, lends trade liberalization a type of "multiplier effect," raising both economic growth and environmental policy stringency.

Kenneth Leonard, Melkiory Masatu

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The most important issue facing experimental economists is the generalizability of lab results. This letter examines more than 1200 doctor/patient consultations, in which scrutiny and duration of treatment were varied. We show that scrutiny has an important but short-lived effect.

Charles Godward , John A List, Mark Thompson

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Anne Alexander , Ralph d'Arge , John A List, Michael Margolis

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The goal of this paper is to provide an investigation of several approaches to valuing ecosystem services and to contribute additional techniques which may be used in evaluating 'green' GDP accounts. Our estimates focus on the ecosystem as a productive economic input, not a stock which is depreciated or depleted over time; as such, it differs with other concepts more frequently employed in green GDP accounting. Most of our results are derived from the analytical fiction that a single owner of the biosphere establishes a market for all ecological resources. This monopolist then appropriates all rents from the human population. The maximum amount the monopolist charges is first assumed to be world gross product less the global human subsistence level. In addition, we examine the excess rents available in factor markets using the assumption of weak complementarity between factor inputs and ecosystem services. We also provide more conservative estimates of the value of ecosystem services by investigating the sustainable price the monopolist could charge the global population and by exploring the effects of compensating wage differentials and a non-monopolist owner of the ecosystem.

Amanda Chuan, Anya Samek

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We conducted a field experiment with a charitable group to investigate whether giving the donor an option to write a personal message to the recipient influences giving behavior. Over 1,500 households were approached in a door-to-door campaign and randomized to either a control or a treatment in which donors could include a card for the recipient. We predict that treatment should increase contributions through making the gift more meaningful, but may also decrease contribution rate by increasing the social or other cost of donating. We find evidence in favor of the cost effect, and no evidence of increased giving.

Pieter A Gautier, Bas van der Klaauw

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We use data from a promotion campaign of NH-Hoteles to study self-selection of participants in a gift-exchange experiment. The promotion campaign allowed guests to pay any non negative amount of money for a stay in one of 36 hotels in Belgium and the Netherlands. The data allow us to distinguish between `regular guests', who booked prior to the announcement of the promotion campaign and guests who booked after the campaign was announced. During the promotion campaign we varied the posted price of a room that was communicated to the guests. Only the regular guests respond to the exogenous variation in the posted price and they pay substantially more on average. This different behavior cannot be explained by differences in satisfaction or observed compositional differences between both groups. We argue that the promotion campaign mainly attracted individuals who find it relatively unimportant to be viewed of as prosocial.

John A List

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Given the importance of job placement for Ph.D.s, it is surprising that economists have not closely examined the factors that affect procuring job interviews for new Ph.D. economists.' In this study, I investigated those factors using a data set gathered at the 1997 American Economic Association (AEA) meetings in New Orleans. My purpose was to increase the information available to Ph.D. candidates who wish to maximize their postgraduation job prospects. In addition, this study may guide undergraduates and master's candidates who seek to pursue a Ph.D. in economics. The results of the findings, however, could benefit more than job seekers-they may provide academic departments and private industry with a comparative baseline for making decisions to interview job candidates. The job market for new Ph.D.s consists of two submarkets-academic and businesshndustry. The following are questions regarding job seekers in both submarkets. (1) Do employers in academia seek the same attributes as businesshndustry? (2) Is there discrimination in the interview decision? (3) Is an MBA important in the Ph.D. market? (4) How many more interviews are secured by candidates with a finished dissertation? (5) How important are teaching and research credentials? (6) Are graduates from top-ranked programs given special consideration in the job market? (7) Do personal letters of recommendation or calls from professors make a difference in the interview decision? (8) How influential are recommendation letters from prestigious economists? (9) What is the marginal effect of submitting another application? A simple theoretic construct provides a basis for understanding the two-step job-search process carried out by new Ph.D. economists.* In the first step, the job seeker decides whether to enter one or both submarkets and determines the optimal number of applications to submit. The second step reflects the actual decision process regarding acceptance or rejection of a job offer. Because a natural prerequisite to securing a job is an initial interview, my main focus in this study was to discover the optimal job search strategies for new Ph.D. economists by determining applicant characteristics that are conducive to obtaining interviews.