Through their writing, people often reflect their values. Since the 1970s, academic economists have gradually changed their third-person pronoun choices, from using the masculine form to incorporating feminine and plural forms. We document this transition empirically, and examine the role of...

Ein Finanzparlament oder vergleichbares Gremium anderen Namens würde finanzielle Entscheidungen treffen oder zumindest kontrollieren für seine jeweilige Organisation, sei diese ein Staat, eine internationale Vereinigung oder ein Verein. Stimmrechte für ein Finanzparlament würden nicht nach...

Freiwilliges Engagement findet in Deutschland in einem breiten Spektrum von Bereichen und Tätigkeitsfeldern statt. Gleichzeitig ist aber über die Tätigkeiten, die freiwillig Engagierte ausüben und deren quantitative Verteilung wenig bekannt. Dieser Beitrag verfolgt daher das Ziel, die...

We consider the problem of allocating multiple units of an indivisible object among a set of agents and collecting payments. Each agent can receive multiple units of the object, and has a (possibly) non-quasi-linear preference on the set of (consumption) bundles. We assume that preferences...

The literature on happiness shows that there are many factors that influence a person’s happiness. Extending previous studies, we investigate the role of the freedom of choice as a key contributing construct in influencing a person’s happiness. We define two hypothetical sub-constructs for...

We develop a formula for the optimal size of a joint savings association between individuals who share the same financial goal and who can save towards that goal at the same rate. Our motivating example and the core of our analysis is a Rotating Savings and Credit Association (ROSCA). We measure...

The difficulty in resurrecting inter-ethnic cooperation in the aftermath of violence and genocide is one of the biggest challenges facing post-conflict societies. Using experimental data from post-genocide Rwanda and Burundi, this paper shows that an unwarranted tendency to blame others for...

We study fiscal spending by supranational unions, where participation is voluntary and countries bargain over contributions to and the allocation of a central budget. We establish and explore the link between the budget's allocation and nations' contributions that occurs since bargaining power...

We study rotation programs within the standard implementation framework under complete information. A rotation program is a myopic stable set whose states are arranged circularly, and agents can effectively move only between two consecutive states. We provide characterizing conditions for the...

Does social media or offline social cohesion overcome collective action problems more effectively when both types of networks are prevalent? We investigate non-violent protests against a place-based economic reform in Austria—a country where one in two citizens uses Facebook but also one in...