Consider a situation where person A undertakes a costly action that benefits person B. This behavior seems altruistic. However, if A expects a reward in return from B, then A's action may be motivated by the expected rewards rather than by pure altruism. The question we address in this...

In this paper we focus on the compliance effects of tax regime changes. According to the economic model of tax evasion, a tax reform should affect compliance through its impact on tax rates and incentives. Our findings demonstrate the importance of at least two further effects not covered by the...

Auctions often involve goods exhibiting a common knowledge ex-post risk that is independent of buyers’ private values or their signals regarding common value components. Esö and White (2004) showed theoretically that ex-post risk leads to precautionary bidding for DARA bidders: Agents reduce...

We analyze how subjects’ self-assessment depends on whether its accuracy is observable to others. We find that women downgrade their selfassessment given observability while men do not. Women avoid the shame they may have if others observe that they overestimated themselves. Men, however, do...