A competitive world

Thomas Buser, Alexander W. Cappelen (), Uri Gneezy () and Bertil Tungodden ()
Additional contact information
Alexander W. Cappelen: Dept. of Economics, Norwegian School of Economics and Business Administration, Postal: NHH, Department of Economics, Helleveien 30, N-5045 Bergen, Norway, https://sites.google.com/view/alexander-w-cappelen/home
Uri Gneezy: Rady School of Management, Postal: Rady School of Management, 9500 Gilman Dr., MC 0553, La Jolla, CA 92093-0093, The United States of America, https://rady.ucsd.edu/faculty-research/faculty/uri-gneezy.html
Bertil Tungodden: Dept. of Economics, Norwegian School of Economics and Business Administration, Postal: NHH, Department of Economics, Helleveien 30, N-5045 Bergen, Norway, https://sites.google.com/view/bertiltungodden/home

No 11/2026, Discussion Paper Series in Economics from Norwegian School of Economics, Department of Economics

Abstract: We provide globally representative evidence on two attitudes toward competition: individuals’ willingness to compete and the importance they attach to boys and girls being willing to compete, using a novel survey module that we fielded as part of the 2022 Gallup World Poll. The data cover more than 66,000 individuals across 62 countries. Men are more willing to compete than women in all but two countries, and willingness to compete is higher among younger, more educated, and higher-income individuals. Attitudes toward children’s willingness to compete vary substantially across countries, with competitiveness valued more for boys in some countries and for girls in others. Both attitudes are systematically related to the economic and social environment. Individuals exposed to greater inequality or faster population growth during their formative years are more willing to compete and place greater importance on children being willing to compete. Greater exposure to gender equality during formative years is associated with smaller gender gaps in both adults’ willingness to compete and attitudes toward the competitiveness of boys and girls. Our findings reveal striking global regularities while highlighting the role of the social environment in shaping attitudes toward competition.

Keywords: willingness to compete; gender; global; representative sample; socialization (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: D91 J16 J24 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 74 pages
Date: 2026-08-28
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-exp, nep-gen and nep-lma
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://nva.sikt.no/registration/01a05ba80dff-d692 ... bb-9423-c15b354426a8 Full text (application/pdf)

Related works:
Working Paper: A Competitive World (2026)
Working Paper: A competitive world (2026)
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:hhs:nhheco:2026_011

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in Discussion Paper Series in Economics from Norwegian School of Economics, Department of Economics NHH, Department of Economics, Helleveien 30, N-5045 Bergen, Norway. Contact information at EDIRC.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Synne Stormoen ().