Are People Conditionally Cooperative? Evidence from a Public Goods Experiment

22 Pages Posted: 6 Jan 2000

See all articles by Urs Fischbacher

Urs Fischbacher

University of Konstanz - Faculty of Economics and Statistics

Simon Gächter

CESifo (Center for Economic Studies and Ifo Institute); IZA Institute of Labor Economics

Ernst Fehr

University of Zurich - Department of Economics

Abstract

We study the importance of conditional cooperation in a one-shot public goods game by using a variant of the strategy-method. We find that a third of the subjects can be classified as free riders, whereas 50 percent are conditional cooperators.

Keywords: voluntary contributions, conditional cooperation, reciprocity, free riding, strategy-method, experiments

JEL Classification: H41, D64, D74, C91

Suggested Citation

Fischbacher, Urs and Gächter, Simon and Fehr, Ernst, Are People Conditionally Cooperative? Evidence from a Public Goods Experiment. Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=203288 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.203288

Urs Fischbacher (Contact Author)

University of Konstanz - Faculty of Economics and Statistics ( email )

Universitaetsstr. 10
78457 Konstanz
Germany

Simon Gächter

CESifo (Center for Economic Studies and Ifo Institute)

Poschinger Str. 5
Munich, DE-81679
Germany

IZA Institute of Labor Economics

P.O. Box 7240
Bonn, D-53072
Germany

Ernst Fehr

University of Zurich - Department of Economics ( email )

Blümlisalpstrasse 10
Zuerich, 8006
Switzerland
+41 1 634 3709 (Phone)
+41 1 634 4907 (Fax)

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