While previous research has shown that social preferences develop in childhood, we study whether this development is accompanied by reduced use of deception when lies would harm others, and increased use of deception to benefit others. In a sample of children aged between 7 and 14, we find...

Recent policy initiatives offer cash payments to children (and often their families) to induce better health and educational choices. These policies implicitly assume that children are especially impatient (i.e., have high discount rates); however, little is known about the nature of children's...

There is economic pressure towards the postponement of the retirement age, but employers are still reluctant to employ older workers. We investigate the comparative behavior of juniors and seniors in experiments conducted both onsite with the employees of two large firms and in a conventional...

This paper presents the results of a laboratory experiment in which workers perform a real-effort task and supervisors report the workers’ performance to the experimenter. The report is non verifiable and determines the earnings of both the supervisor and the worker. We find that not all the...

In a series of experiments conducted in Belgium (Wallonia and Flanders), France and the Netherlands, we compare behavior regarding tax evasion and welfare dodging, with and without information about others’ behavior. Subjects have to decide between a "registered" income, the realization of...

Economic decisions depend on both actual outcomes as well as perceived intentions. In this paper, we examine whether and how the relative importance of outcomes or intentions for economic decisions develops with age. We report the results of ultimatum games with children, teens and university...

We report evidence from public goods experiments with and without punishment which we conducted in Russia with 566 urban and rural participants of young and mature age cohorts. Russia is interesting for studying voluntary cooperation because of its long history of collectivism, and a huge...

The labor economics literature has shown that the “efficient bargaining” model, in which wage and employment are negotiated simultaneously, is less frequently used on unionized markets than the less efficient “right-to-manage” model, in which wage is determined via bargaining and...

In a laboratory experiment, subjects played ten two-person 3x3 constant sum games and stated beliefs about the frequencies of play by their opponents. Contrary to previous experimental evidence, game-theoretical predictions work well: 80% of actions coincided with Nash equilibrium, subjects were...

Economic theory predicts that in a first-price auction with equal and observable valuations, bidders earn zero profits. Theory also predicts that if valuations are not common knowledge, then since it is weakly dominated to bid your valuation, bidders will bid less and earn positive profits....