Amidst a sharp increase in household debt levels, many countries have substantially reformedtheir consumer bankruptcy regulations. I first classify the mechanisms triggered by current U.S.and European bankruptcy regulations and then evaluate these mechanisms within a hidden actionmodel. I...

We investigate the gender specific inter-temporal allocation behavior ofspouses with different deterministic life expectations in an experimentwhere the gender of one's partner is known. In each period of theirlife both partners propose a consumption level one of which is thenrandomly...

We investigate the intertemporal and interpersonal allocation behavior ofspouses with different deterministic life expectations in an experiment. In eachperiod of their life both partners propose a consumption level one of which isthen randomly implemented. In spite of the complex dynamics...

Many decisions in economics and finance have to be made under severe time pressure. Furthermore, payoffs frequently depend on the speed of decision-making, like, for instance, when buying and selling stocks. In this paper, we examine the influence of time pressure and time-dependent incentive...

One-shot interaction and repeated interaction often co-exist in the real world. We study possible behavioral effects of this co-existence in a principal-agent setting, in which a principal simultaneously employs a permanent and a temporary agent. Our experimental results indicate that there is...

This article examines the nature of human behavior in a nested socialdilemma referred to as the Spillover Game. Players are divided into twogroups with positive production interdependencies. Based on theoreticallyderived opportunistic, local, and global optima, our experimental...

Although one may hope to achieve equality of stated profits withoutenforcing it, one may not trust in such voluntary equality seeking andrather try to impose rules (of bidding) guaranteeing it.[...]

Sanctions are widely used to promote compliance in principal-agent-relationships.While there is ample evidence confirming the predicted positive incentive effect of sanctions,it has also been shown that imposing sanctions may in fact reduce complianceby crowding-out intrinsic motivation. We add...

We experimentally test whether intentional and observable discriminatorypay of symmetric agents in the Winter (2004) game causes lowpaid agents to reduce effort. We control for intentionality of wages byeither allowing a principal to determine wages or by implementing arandom process. Our main...

In this paper, we study a voluntary contribution mechanism withone-way communication. The relevance of one person’s words is assessedby assigning exogeniously the role of the ‘communicator’ to onegroup member. Contrary to the view that the mutual exchange ofpromises is necessary for the...