It is difficult to identify acts that are purely altruistic, and do not have some level of egoism or self-interest involved. By considering situations where team members seemingly have nothing to gain by the way they distribute points to others with regard to peer evaluation, and where their...

Extensive research in economics explores generosity in monetary allocations. However, generosity often involves the allocation of non-monetary goods or experiences. Existing evidence suggests that generosity may be higher in such contexts, though no direct comparison exists. Here, we compare...

The “Hedonistic Paradox” states that homo economicus, or someone who seeks happiness for him- or herself, will not find it, but the person who helps others will. This study examines two questions in connection with happiness and generosity. First, do more generous people, as identified in...

I ran an experiment in order to evaluate the relationship, if any, between power, or the search for power, and the degree of altruism. In particular I experimentally tested whether an organization structured in a strictly hierarchical way was able to reduce the degree of altruism of a group of...

This paper explores the determinants of survival in a life-and-death situation created by an external and unpredictable shock. We are interested in seeing whether pro-social behaviour matters in such extreme situations. We therefore focus on the sinking of the RMS Titanic as a quasi-natural...

Intergenerational altruism and contemporaneous cooperation are both important to the provision of long-lived public goods. Equilibrium climate protection may depend more sensitively on either of these considerations, depending on the type of policy rule one examines. This conclusion is based on...

In this paper I follow Abel and Kotlikoff 1994 non-parametric approach based on consumption cohort data to test for intergenerational altruism among Italian households. The Italian socio-economic framework represents an interesting ground to test for the Barro’s 1974 model given the stronger...

This paper studies social welfare in a heterogeneous population under the criteria of efficiency and sustainable heterogeneity. As is well known, heterogeneity in time preference results in substantial inequality. This paper shows that, even if households have heterogeneous preferences, there is...