In good times and bad – Reciprocal behavior at the workplace in times of economic crises

Leonie Gerhards and Matthias Heinz

Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, 2017, vol. 134, issue C, 228-239

Abstract: This laboratory experiment analyzes employer–employee relations in the face of an exogenous shock. We implement a two-period gift-exchange game in which the employer can be hit by an adverse shock in the second period. We find that the mere possibility of the shock encourages employers to pay significantly higher wages in the first period. These higher first period wages translate into increased effort levels in the second period, independent of the actual occurrence of the shock. Our results suggest that the mere possibility of an exogenous shock strengthens the cooperation between individuals, which can ultimately mitigate its negative impact on total profits.

Keywords: Gift-exchange; Wage cuts; Exogenous shock; Reciprocity (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C9 J3 M5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (7)

Downloads: (external link)
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167268116303043
Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jeborg:v:134:y:2017:i:c:p:228-239

DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2016.12.021

Access Statistics for this article

Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization is currently edited by Houser, D. and Puzzello, D.

More articles in Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization from Elsevier
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Catherine Liu ().