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Abstract:
This paper examines cultural differences in attitudes towards corruption by analysing individual-decision making in a corrupt experimental environment. Attitudes towards corruption play a critical role in the persistence of corruption. Our experiments differentiate between the incentives to engage in corrupt behaviour and the incentives to punish corrupt behaviour and allow us to explore whether, in environments characterized by lower levels of corruption, there is both a lower propensity to engage in corrupt behaviour and a higher propensity to punish corrupt behaviour. Based on experiments run in Australia Melbourne), India (Delhi), Indonesia (Jakarta) and Singapore, we find that there is more variation in the propensities to punish corrupt behaviour than in the propensities to engage in corrupt behaviour across cultures. The results reveal that the subjects in India exhibit a higher tolerance towards corruption than the subjects in Australia while the subjects in Indonesia behave similarly to those in Australia. The subjects in Singapore have a higher propensity to engage in corruption than the subjects in Australia. We also vary our experimental design to examine the impact of a more effective punishment system and the effect of the perceived cost of bribery.

Corruption, experiments, punishment, cultural analysis

Abstract:
We use a two-person extensive form bargaining game to examine individuals' trusting and reciprocal behavior and how those relate to their scores on a trust survey. In keeping with prior research, we find that the "self-interested" outcome is rejected by a majority of individuals. People who score high on the trust survey are both trusting and are also trustworthy, in that they reciprocate others' trust. But, people with low trust scores often exhibit trust but are not trustworthy. These "inconsistent trusters" seem to be interested in exploiting the trust and trustworthiness of others in increasing their own payoff.

Trust, Reciprocity, Social Values Orientation, Sequential Game, Bargaining

Abstract:
In recent years, a substantial body of work has explored the differences in the behavior of men and women in a variety of economic transactions. We contribute to this literature by investigating gender differences in behavior when confronted with a common bribery problem. Our study departs from the previous literature on gender and corruption by using economic experiments. Based on data collected in Australia (Melbourne), India (Delhi), Indonesia (Jakarta) and Singapore, we show that while women in Australia are less tolerant of corruption than men in Australia, there are no significant gender differences in the propensities to engage in and punish corrupt behavior in India, Indonesia and Singapore. Hence, our findings suggest that the gender differences reported in the previous studies may not be nearly as universal as stated and may be more culture-specific. We also explore behavioral differences by gender across countries and find that there are larger variations in women's behavior towards corruption than in men's across the countries in our sample.

Gender, Corruption, Experiments, Punishment, Multicultural Analysis

Abstract:
We study a linear public goods game using an inter-generational approach. Subjects in one generation leave advice for the succeeding generation via free-form messages. Such advice can be private knowledge (advice left by one player in generation t is given only to his or her immediate successor in generation t+1), public knowledge (advice left by players of generation t is made available to all members of generation t+1), and common knowledge (where the advice is not only public but is also read aloud by the experimenter). Common knowledge of advice generates a process of social learning that leads to high contributions and less free-riding. This behaviour is sustained by advice that is generally exhortative, suggesting high contributions, which in turn creates optimistic beliefs among subjects about others' contributions. We suggest that socially connected communities may achieve high contributions to a public good even in the absence of punishment for norm violators.

Abstract:
We adopt an inter-generational approach to the public goods game where one generation of subjects leave advice for the succeeding generation via free form messages. Such advice can be private knowledge (advice left by one player in generation t is given only to her immediate successor in generation t+1), almost common knowledge (advice left by players of generation t is made available to all members of generation t+1) and common knowledge (where the advice from the preceding generation is not only made public but also read aloud by the experimenter). We find that when advice is common knowledge it generates a process of social learning and norm creation that leads to high contributions over time and also mitigates problems of free riding. Such high contributions are sustained by advice that is generally exhortative, suggesting high contributions, which in turn create optimistic beliefs, especially among conditional co-operators, about the contributions to be made by other subjects. Our results suggest that socially connected communities may be able to achieve high contributions to a public good even in the absence of any punishment opportunities of norm violators.

Voluntary contributions mechanism, Advice, Beliefs, Conditional

Abstract:
In this experiment groups of 8 subjects are recruited into the lab and play Van Huyck et al.'s (1990) Minimum Game for 10 periods. After his participation is over each subject is replaced by another agent, his laboratory descendant, who then plays the game for another 10 periods with a fresh group of new subjects so the generations are non-overlapping. Advice from a member of one generation to his successor can be passed along via free-form messages that generation t players leave for their generation t+1 successors. Finally, payoffs span generations in the sense that the payoff to a generation t player is equal to what he has earned during his lifetime plus what their children earn. It was our conjecture that if we played the Minimum Game using such an inter-generational design then, over time, generations would be able to "talk themselves to efficiency" in the sense that after playing the game, if any generation converged to a Pareto-worst equilibrium, they might advise the next generation to choose higher. We find is that it was much harder for societies to "talk themselves to efficiency" than we expected. More precisely, we find that the Pareto dominant equilibrium emerges only in circumstances where advice is not only public but its publicness is common knowledge. Almost common knowledge is not enough.

Minimum game, Coordination problem, Common Knowledge, Inter-generational Games

Abstract:
This paper uses data from rural India to analyse how cultivating household and plot level characteristics affect contract choice on a particular plot of land. We estimate a sequential choice model where the landowner first decides whether to cultivate the land on his own (possibly with hired labour) or to lease it out. If the latter, then a choice is made between fixed-rent or share-cropping. One interesting finding is that the greater the value of the plot, the greater is the probability that the plot is owner cultivated. Moreover, among tenant cultivated plots, higher value plots are share-cropped.

Abstract:
We use experiments to investigate the use of advice as a coordinating device in the 'Minimum Effort Game' which is a coordination game with weak strategic complementarities and Pareto-ranked equilibria. The game is played by non-overlapping generations of players who, after they are done, pass on advice to their successors who take their place in the game. We conjectured that this inter-generational design might enable subjects to converge to the payoff-dominant outcome. We find that coordination is most likely to result when the advice is made public and also distributed in a manner that makes it common knowledge.