Does Scarcity Reduce Cooperation? Experimental Evidence from Rural Tanzania
Publikation: Working paper › Forskning
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Does Scarcity Reduce Cooperation? Experimental Evidence from Rural Tanzania. / Agneman, Gustav; Falco, Paolo; Joel, Exaud; Selejio, Onesmo.
2020.Publikation: Working paper › Forskning
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TY - UNPB
T1 - Does Scarcity Reduce Cooperation? Experimental Evidence from Rural Tanzania
AU - Agneman, Gustav
AU - Falco, Paolo
AU - Joel, Exaud
AU - Selejio, Onesmo
PY - 2020
Y1 - 2020
N2 - Cooperation is essential to reap efficiency gains from specialization, not least in poor com-munities where economic transactions often are informal. Yet, cooperation might be moredifficult to sustain under scarcity, since defecting from a cooperative equilibrium can yieldsafe, short-run benefits. In this study, we investigate how scarcity affects cooperation byleveraging exogenous variation in economic conditions induced by the Msimu harvest in ru-ral Tanzania. We document significant changes in food consumption between the pre- andpost-harvest period, and show that lean season scarcity reduces socially efficient but per-sonally risky investments in a framed Investment Game. This can contribute to what iscommonly referred to as a behavioral poverty trap.
AB - Cooperation is essential to reap efficiency gains from specialization, not least in poor com-munities where economic transactions often are informal. Yet, cooperation might be moredifficult to sustain under scarcity, since defecting from a cooperative equilibrium can yieldsafe, short-run benefits. In this study, we investigate how scarcity affects cooperation byleveraging exogenous variation in economic conditions induced by the Msimu harvest in ru-ral Tanzania. We document significant changes in food consumption between the pre- andpost-harvest period, and show that lean season scarcity reduces socially efficient but per-sonally risky investments in a framed Investment Game. This can contribute to what iscommonly referred to as a behavioral poverty trap.
KW - Faculty of Social Sciences
KW - scarcity
KW - cooperation
KW - field experiment
M3 - Working paper
T3 - Publications of the Development Economic Research Group (DERG)
BT - Does Scarcity Reduce Cooperation? Experimental Evidence from Rural Tanzania
ER -
ID: 254468072