Luck or rights? An experiment on preferences for redistribution following inheritance of opportunity
We conducted an experiment to examine whether individuals are more likely to support the redistribution of income stemming from the inequality of inherited opportunities. Specifically, we randomly and anonymously paired two strangers in a lab setting to determine whether the source of the opportunit...
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sg-ntu-dr.10356-1713352023-10-23T04:41:38Z Luck or rights? An experiment on preferences for redistribution following inheritance of opportunity Lekfuangfu, Warn N. Powdthavee, Nattavudh Riyanto, Yohanes Eko School of Social Sciences Social sciences::General Inequality of Opportunity Fairness We conducted an experiment to examine whether individuals are more likely to support the redistribution of income stemming from the inequality of inherited opportunities. Specifically, we randomly and anonymously paired two strangers in a lab setting to determine whether the source of the opportunity from the ‘testator’ subjects influences the ‘heir’ subjects’ redistributive decisions. We find that, on average, the highest level of redistribution occurs among heirs who received their winning opportunity through pure luck. This result, which is robust to controlling for personal characteristics and ex-ante transfer, supports the meritocratic fairness hypothesis, which posits that individuals generally perceive endowment generated by luck as less deserving than by effort. However, we discovered that redistribution is, on average, similar between subjects who won through their own efforts and those who won because of having inherited someone else's effort. This is in line with the ‘inheritance entitlement hypothesis’, which suggests an internalization of inheritance when the narrative of effort is passed down from the testator to the heir. Thus, our results suggest that people feel less entitled to bequests and inheritance when the randomness of inheritance is made more salient to them. 2023-10-23T04:41:38Z 2023-10-23T04:41:38Z 2023 Journal Article Lekfuangfu, W. N., Powdthavee, N. & Riyanto, Y. E. (2023). Luck or rights? An experiment on preferences for redistribution following inheritance of opportunity. Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics, 106, 102078-. https://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.socec.2023.102078 2214-8043 https://hdl.handle.net/10356/171335 10.1016/j.socec.2023.102078 2-s2.0-85170218727 106 102078 en Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics © 2023 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. |
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Social sciences::General Inequality of Opportunity Fairness Lekfuangfu, Warn N. Powdthavee, Nattavudh Riyanto, Yohanes Eko Luck or rights? An experiment on preferences for redistribution following inheritance of opportunity |
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We conducted an experiment to examine whether individuals are more likely to support the redistribution of income stemming from the inequality of inherited opportunities. Specifically, we randomly and anonymously paired two strangers in a lab setting to determine whether the source of the opportunity from the ‘testator’ subjects influences the ‘heir’ subjects’ redistributive decisions. We find that, on average, the highest level of redistribution occurs among heirs who received their winning opportunity through pure luck. This result, which is robust to controlling for personal characteristics and ex-ante transfer, supports the meritocratic fairness hypothesis, which posits that individuals generally perceive endowment generated by luck as less deserving than by effort. However, we discovered that redistribution is, on average, similar between subjects who won through their own efforts and those who won because of having inherited someone else's effort. This is in line with the ‘inheritance entitlement hypothesis’, which suggests an internalization of inheritance when the narrative of effort is passed down from the testator to the heir. Thus, our results suggest that people feel less entitled to bequests and inheritance when the randomness of inheritance is made more salient to them. |
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School of Social Sciences |
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School of Social Sciences Lekfuangfu, Warn N. Powdthavee, Nattavudh Riyanto, Yohanes Eko |
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Article |
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Lekfuangfu, Warn N. Powdthavee, Nattavudh Riyanto, Yohanes Eko |
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Lekfuangfu, Warn N. |
title |
Luck or rights? An experiment on preferences for redistribution following inheritance of opportunity |
title_short |
Luck or rights? An experiment on preferences for redistribution following inheritance of opportunity |
title_full |
Luck or rights? An experiment on preferences for redistribution following inheritance of opportunity |
title_fullStr |
Luck or rights? An experiment on preferences for redistribution following inheritance of opportunity |
title_full_unstemmed |
Luck or rights? An experiment on preferences for redistribution following inheritance of opportunity |
title_sort |
luck or rights? an experiment on preferences for redistribution following inheritance of opportunity |
publishDate |
2023 |
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https://hdl.handle.net/10356/171335 |
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1781793764122034176 |