We provide a solution to the free-rider problem in the provision of a public good. To this end we define a biased indirect contribution game which provides the efficient amount of the public good in non-cooperative Nash equilibrium. No confiscatory taxes or other means of coercion are used. We...

This paper analyzes the impact of public investment on the dynamics of private capital formation in an intertemporal optimizing market-clearing framework. The key feature characterizing the analysis is that the public good is treated as a durable capital good, subject to congestion. We show how...

We study conditional cooperation based on a sequential two-person linear public good game in which a trusting first contributor can be exploited by a second contributor. After playing this game the first contributor is allowed to punish the second contributor. The consequences of sanctioning...

We study theoretically and experimentally a two-person partnership game whereby agents only see the uncertain outcome of their joint effort but not how much the other agent contributed to it. The model combines problems of free-riding present in public good production and in teams with imperfect...

We conduct a contribution game for a real public good and show that when the contributors value the real public good highly, they increase their contributions in each round. Thus, contrary to previous literature, free riding decreases over rounds and the end-game effect is reversed.

This paper investigates the time allocation of women in Ghana as a trade-off between domestic chores and market-oriented activities when households are provided with water and electricity infrastructure. Using the Ghana Living Standards Survey, Round Four, we find that the time spent on...

We study the effects of leadership in the provision of public goods by examining (i) the relative importance of reward and punishment as leadership devices, (ii) whether endogenous leadership is more efficient than exogenously enforced leadership, and (iii) whether leaders contributing last,...

We show in a public goods experiment on three continents that conditional cooperation is a universal behavioral regularity. Yet, the number of conditional cooperators and the extent of conditional cooperation are much higher in the U.S.A. than anywhere else.

This paper studies the effect of introducing costly partner selection for the voluntary contribution to a public good. Subjects participate in six sequences of five rounds of a twoperson public good game in partner design. At the end of each sequence, subjects can select a new partner out of six...

The theory of international environmental agreements overwhelmingly assumes that governments engage as unitary agents. Each government makes choices based on benefits and costs that are simple national aggregates, and similarly on a single set of national-level motivations, together drawing a...