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Government intervention often gives rise to contests and the government can influence their outcome by choosing their type. We consider a contest with two interest groups: one that is governed by a central planner and one that is not. Rent dissipation is compared under two well-known contest...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10013061935
economics. This paper explores voting on a scheme of intergroup competition which facilitates cooperation in a social dilemma … electoral outcome depends strongly on specific voting rules of institutional choice. If the majority decides, competition is …
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10013104948
This paper studies the assignment of decision makers to two committees that make decisions by a simple majority rule. There is an even number of decision makers at each of various skill levels and each committee has an odd number of members. Surprisingly, even with the symmetric assumptions in...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10013123565
We study the interaction between competitive markets that produce large but unequally distributed welfare gains and elections through which the poor majority can redistribute income away from the rich minority. In our simple laboratory democracy, subjects first earn their income by trading in a...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10013134222
politicians, both with theory and data. The theory is based on a version of the career concerns model of political agency with … implications of the theory and identify the causal effect of larger federal transfers on political corruption and the observed … features of political candidates at the municipal level. In accordance with the predictions of the theory, we find that larger …
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10013148349
We study communication in committees selecting one of two alternatives when consensus is required and agents have private information about their preferences. Delaying the decision is costly, so a form of multiplayer war of attrition emerges. Waiting allows voters to express the intensity of...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10012915720
This paper uses data on bill sponsorship and cosponsorship in the U.S. House of Representatives to estimate gender differences in cooperative behavior. We employ a number of econometric methodologies to address the potential selection of female representatives into electoral districts with...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10012984869
The form of contests for a single fixed prize can be determined by a designer who maximizes the contestants' efforts. This paper establishes that, under common knowledge of the two asymmetric contestants' prize valuations, a fair Tullock-type endogenously determined lottery is always superior to...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10013096475
When groups face difficult problems, the voice of experts may be lost in the noise of others' contributions. We present results from a 'naturally noisy' setting, a large first-year undergraduate class, in which the 'expert's voice is lost' to such a degree that it is in fact optimal for all...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10012826744
We develop a new experiment to study the emergence of welfare-reducing bilateral alliances within larger groups, and the effectiveness of institutional interventions to curtail this reciprocal alliance behaviour. In each of the 25 rounds of our experiments, a player (the 'allocator') nominates...
Persistent link: https://www.econbiz.de/10013023388