The Consequences of Inequality: Beliefs and Redistributive Preferences

Max Lobeck () and Morten Nyborg Morten.Stostad@nhh.no ()
Additional contact information
Max Lobeck: University of Konstanz, Postal: Universitätsstraße 10, 78464 Konstanz, Tyskland
Morten Nyborg Morten.Stostad@nhh.no: Dept. of Economics, Norwegian School of Economics and Business Administration, Postal: NHH, Department of Economics, Helleveien 30, N-5045 Bergen, Norway

No 17/2023, Discussion Paper Series in Economics from Norwegian School of Economics, Department of Economics

Abstract: What matters for individuals’ preferences for redistribution? In this paper we show that consequentialist beliefs about inequality – beliefs about how economic inequality changes the crime rate or the quality of democratic institutions, for example – have a large causal impact on individuals’ redistributive preferences. Using two representative surveys of a combined 6,731 U.S. citizens, we show that a majority of respondents believe that inequality leads to a wide range of negative societal outcomes. We establish a causal link from such beliefs to individuals’ redistributive preferences by using exogenously provided video information treatments. With this and other methods we show that inequality externality beliefs impact redistributive preferences on the same order of magnitude as broad economic fairness views. These inequality externality beliefs are relatively equally held across political affiliations as well as incomes. We discuss whether a focus on inequality’s consequences could shape a distinct conversation about redistribution.

Keywords: Behavioural economics; inequality; labour economics; public economics (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: H23 J18 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 108 pages
Date: 2023-10-10
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-lab
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (8)

Downloads: (external link)
https://openaccess.nhh.no/nhh-xmlui/handle/11250/3096377 Full text file (application/pdf)

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:hhs:nhheco:2023_017

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 ().