Social dilemmas among unequals

Oliver Hauser, Christian Hilbe (), Krishnendu Chatterjee and Martin A. Nowak ()
Additional contact information
Christian Hilbe: IST Austria
Krishnendu Chatterjee: IST Austria
Martin A. Nowak: Harvard University

Nature, 2019, vol. 572, issue 7770, 524-527

Abstract: Abstract Direct reciprocity is a powerful mechanism for the evolution of cooperation on the basis of repeated interactions1–4. It requires that interacting individuals are sufficiently equal, such that everyone faces similar consequences when they cooperate or defect. Yet inequality is ubiquitous among humans5,6 and is generally considered to undermine cooperation and welfare7–10. Most previous models of reciprocity do not include inequality11–15. These models assume that individuals are the same in all relevant aspects. Here we introduce a general framework to study direct reciprocity among unequal individuals. Our model allows for multiple sources of inequality. Subjects can differ in their endowments, their productivities and in how much they benefit from public goods. We find that extreme inequality prevents cooperation. But if subjects differ in productivity, some endowment inequality can be necessary for cooperation to prevail. Our mathematical predictions are supported by a behavioural experiment in which we vary the endowments and productivities of the subjects. We observe that overall welfare is maximized when the two sources of heterogeneity are aligned, such that more productive individuals receive higher endowments. By contrast, when endowments and productivities are misaligned, cooperation quickly breaks down. Our findings have implications for policy-makers concerned with equity, efficiency and the provisioning of public goods.

Date: 2019
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (41)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-019-1488-5 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

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:nat:nature:v:572:y:2019:i:7770:d:10.1038_s41586-019-1488-5

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/

DOI: 10.1038/s41586-019-1488-5

Access Statistics for this article

Nature is currently edited by Magdalena Skipper

More articles in Nature from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().