Wage Delegation in the Field
Sabrina Jeworrek, Vanessa Mertins
Journal of Economics and Management Strategy,
Nr. 4,
2019
Abstract
By conducting a natural field experiment, we analyze the managerial policy of delegating the wage choice to employees. We find that this policy enhances performance significantly, which is remarkable since allocated wage premiums of the same size have no effect at all. Observed self‐imposed wage restraints and absence of negative peer effects speak in favor of wage delegation, although the chosen wage premium levels severely dampen its net value. Additional experimental and survey data provide important insights into employees' underlying motivations.
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Gender Stereotypes still in MIND: Information on Relative Performance and Competition Entry
Sabrina Jeworrek
Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics,
October
2019
Abstract
By conducting a laboratory experiment, I test whether the gender tournament gap diminishes in its size after providing information on the relative performance of the two genders. Indeed, the gap shrinks sizeably, it even becomes statistically insignificant. Hence, individuals’ entry decisions seem to be driven not only by incorrect self-assessments in general but also by incorrect stereotypical beliefs about the genders’ average abilities. Overconfident men opt less often for the tournament and, thereby, increase their expected payoff. Overall efficiency, however, is not affected by the intervention.
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Police Reorganization and Crime: Evidence from Police Station Closures
Sebastian Blesse, André Diegmann
Abstract
Does the administrative organization of police affect crime? In answering this question, we focus on the reorganization of local police agencies. Specifically, we study the effects police force reallocation via station closures has on local crime. We do this by exploiting a quasi-experiment where a reform substantially reduced the number of police stations. Combining a matching strategy with an event-study design, we find no effects on total theft. Police station closures, however, open up tempting opportunities for criminals in car theft and burglary in residential properties. We can rule out that our effects arise from incapacitation, crime displacement, or changes in employment of local police forces. Our results suggest that criminals are less deterred after police station closures and use the opportunity to steal more costly goods.
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Gift-exchange in Society and the Social Integration of Refugees: Evidence from a Field, a Laboratory, and a Survey Experiment
Sabrina Jeworrek, Vanessa Mertins, Bernd Josef Leisen
Abstract
Refugee integration requires broad support from the host society, but only a minority of the host population is actively engaged. Given that most individuals reciprocate kind behaviour, we examine the idea that the proportion of supporters will increase as a reciprocal response to refugees’ contributions to society through volunteering. Our nationwide survey experiment shows that citizens’ intentions to contribute time and money rise significantly when they learn about refugees’ pro-social activities. Importantly, this result holds for individuals who have not been in contact with refugees. We complement this investigation with experiments in the lab and the field that confirm our findings for actual behaviour.
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College Choice, Selection, and Allocation Mechanisms: A Structural Empirical Analysis
J.-R. Carvalho, T. Magnac, Qizhou Xiong
Quantitative Economics,
Nr. 3,
2019
Abstract
We use rich microeconomic data on performance and choices of students at college entry to analyze interactions between the selection mechanism, eliciting college preferences through exams, and the allocation mechanism. We set up a framework in which success probabilities and student preferences are shown to be identified from data on their choices and their exam grades under exclusion restrictions and support conditions. The counterfactuals we consider balance the severity of congestion and the quality of the match between schools and students. Moving to deferred acceptance or inverting the timing of choices and exams are shown to increase welfare. Redistribution among students and among schools is also sizeable in all counterfactual experiments.
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Mission, Motivation, and the Active Decision to Work for a Social Cause
Sabrina Jeworrek, Vanessa Mertins
Abstract
The mission of a job does not only affect the type of worker attracted to an organisation, but may also provide incentives to an existing workforce. We conducted a natural field experiment with 267 short-time workers and randomly allocated them to either a prosocial or a commercial job. Our data suggest that the mission of a job itself has a performance enhancing motivational impact on particular individuals only, i.e., workers with a prosocial attitude. However, the mission is very important if it has been actively selected. Those workers who have chosen to contribute to a social cause outperform the ones randomly assigned to the same job by about 15 percent. This effect seems to be a universal phenomenon which is not driven by information about the alternative job, the choice itself or a particular subgroup.
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Predicting Free-riding in a Public Goods Game – Analysis of Content and Dynamic Facial Expressions in Face-to-Face Communication
Dmitri Bershadskyy, Ehsan Othman, Frerk Saxen
IWH Discussion Papers,
Nr. 9,
2019
Abstract
This paper illustrates how audio-visual data from pre-play face-to-face communication can be used to identify groups which contain free-riders in a public goods experiment. It focuses on two channels over which face-to-face communication influences contributions to a public good. Firstly, the contents of the face-to-face communication are investigated by categorising specific strategic information and using simple meta-data. Secondly, a machine-learning approach to analyse facial expressions of the subjects during their communications is implemented. These approaches constitute the first of their kind, analysing content and facial expressions in face-to-face communication aiming to predict the behaviour of the subjects in a public goods game. The analysis shows that verbally mentioning to fully contribute to the public good until the very end and communicating through facial clues reduce the commonly observed end-game behaviour. The length of the face-to-face communication quantified in number of words is further a good measure to predict cooperation behaviour towards the end of the game. The obtained findings provide first insights how a priori available information can be utilised to predict free-riding behaviour in public goods games.
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Asset Allocation in Bankruptcy
Shai B. Bernstein, Emanuele Colonnelli, Benjamin Iverson
Journal of Finance,
Nr. 1,
2019
Abstract
This paper investigates the consequences of liquidation and reorganization on the allocation and subsequent utilization of assets in bankruptcy. Using the random assignment of judges to bankruptcy cases as a natural experiment that forces some firms into liquidation, we find that the long-run utilization of assets of liquidated firms is lower relative to assets of reorganized firms. These effects are concentrated in thin markets with few potential users and in areas with low access to finance. These findings suggest that when search frictions are large, liquidation can lead to inefficient allocation of assets in bankruptcy.
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Banks Response to Higher Capital Requirements: Evidence from a Quasi-natural Experiment
Reint E. Gropp, Thomas Mosk, Steven Ongena, Carlo Wix
Review of Financial Studies,
Nr. 1,
2019
Abstract
We study the impact of higher capital requirements on banks’ balance sheets and their transmission to the real economy. The 2011 EBA capital exercise is an almost ideal quasi-natural experiment to identify this impact with a difference-in-differences matching estimator. We find that treated banks increase their capital ratios by reducing their risk-weighted assets, not by raising their levels of equity, consistent with debt overhang. Banks reduce lending to corporate and retail customers, resulting in lower asset, investment, and sales growth for firms obtaining a larger share of their bank credit from the treated banks.
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Taken by Storm: Business Financing and Survival in the Aftermath of Hurricane Katrina
Emek Basker, Javier Miranda
Journal of Economic Geography,
Nr. 6,
2018
Abstract
We use Hurricane Katrina’s damage to the Mississippi coast in 2005 as a natural experiment to study business survival in the aftermath of a capital-destruction shock. We find very low survival rates for businesses that incurred physical damage, particularly for small firms and less-productive establishments. Conditional on survival, larger and more-productive businesses that rebuilt their operations hired more workers than their smaller and less-productive counterparts. Auxiliary evidence from the Survey of Business Owners suggests that the differential size effect is tied to the presence of financial constraints, pointing to a socially inefficient level of exits and to distortions of allocative efficiency in response to this negative shock. Over time, the size advantage disappeared and market mechanisms seem to prevail.
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