In many economic applications involving comparisons of multivariate distributions, supermodularity of an objective function is a natural property for capturing a preference for greater interdependence. One multivariate distribution dominates another according to the supermodular stochastic...

Orderings of interdependence among random variables are useful in many economic contexts, for example, in assessing ex post inequality under uncertainty; in comparing multidimensional inequality; in valuing portfolios of assets or insurance policies; and in assessing systemic risk. We explore...

We develop and implement a new measure for inequality aversion: two peers are endowed with identical binary lotteries and the only choice they make is whether they want to play out the lotteries independently or with perfect positive correlation (coupling). Coupling has no other e ect than...

A series of experiments compares bargaining behavior under three different settings: no arbitration, conventional and final offer arbitration. Under no arbitration disputes with zero payoffs were around 10%, while the pie was equally split in less than half of the cases. Under conventional...

The paper aims at a conceptual contribution to the normative economic analysis of rural de-velopment (RD) policies. RD is regarded as a problem of interaction between individuals; (lacking) structural change or the (missing) integration of externalities are therefore recon-structed as...

Most incomes underlie some risk, i.e. ex ante they can be regarded as a lottery ticket. In every society, the lucky winners of this lottery compensate unlucky losers (unemployed workers or bankrupt entrepreneurs) privately and/or by public insurances. Do voluntary solidarity payments depend on...

This paper shows that the public provision of private goods may be justified on pure efficiency grounds in an environment where individuals have relative consumption concerns. By providing private goods, governments directly intervene in the consumption structure, and thereby have an instrument...

This paper uses SOEP data to study the distributional effect of intergenerational transfers on the wealth distribution of German households. Similar to most other central European countries, Germany is likely to face a period of increasing aggregate bequest flows. At the same time, there is an...

Supporters of left-wing parties typically place more emphasis on redistributive policies than right-wing voters. I investigate whether this difference in tolerating inequality is amplified by suspicious success - achievements that may arise from cheating. Using a laboratory experiment, I...