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On the Nature of Fair Behavior
Author(s) -
Falk Armin,
Fehr Ernst,
Fischbacher Urs
Publication year - 2003
Publication title -
economic inquiry
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.823
H-Index - 72
eISSN - 1465-7295
pISSN - 0095-2583
DOI - 10.1093/ei/41.1.20
Subject(s) - ultimatum game , economics , reciprocal , microeconomics , equity (law) , action (physics) , set (abstract data type) , mathematical economics , positive economics , computer science , law , political science , linguistics , philosophy , physics , programming language , quantum mechanics
This article shows that identical offers in an ultimatum game generate systematically different rejection rates depending on the other offers that are available to the proposer. This result casts doubt on the consequentialist practice in economics to define the utility of an action solely in terms of the consequences of the action irrespective of the set of alternatives. It means in particular that negatively reciprocal behavior cannot be fully captured by equity models that are exclusively based on preferences over the distribution of material payoffs.