Experimental Evidence on Other-Regarding Preferences: Dictators Give to Help the Less Fortunate

Oleg Korenok, Edward Millner (emillner@vcu.edu) and Laura Razzolini (lrazzolini@ua.edu)
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Edward Millner: Department of Economics, VCU School of Business

No 807, Working Papers from VCU School of Business, Department of Economics

Abstract: In the typical dictator game, the majority of dictators choose to pass at least a portion of their endowment to recipients who are given no endowment. We modify the dictator game by giving the recipient an endowment. We then measure the impact of varying the recipient’s endowment on the amount passed by the dictator. As the recipient’s endowment increases, the majority of dictators decrease the amount passed and pass nothing when endowments are equalized. We conclude that in the typical dictator game most dictators pass because they care about the recipients who are given no endowments.

Keywords: Dictator game; Other-regarding preferences; Altruism (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: C91 D63 D64 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 23 pages
Date: 2008-08, Revised 2009-08
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-cbe, nep-exp and nep-upt
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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http://www.people.vcu.edu/~okorenok/DictatorEquity_2009-07-27.pdf Revised version, 2009 (application/pdf)
http://www.people.vcu.edu/~okorenok/Instructions.pdf Instructions (application/pdf)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:vcu:wpaper:0807

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