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Abstract
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Before
John Stuart Mill claimed that “men do not desire merely to be rich, but richer than other men.” Do people desire to be richer than others? Or is it that people desire favorable comparisons to others more generally, and being richer is merely a proxy for this ineffable relativity? We conduct an online experiment absent choice in which we measure subjective well-being (SWB) before and after an exogenous shock that reveals to subjects how many experimental points they and another subject receive, and whether or not points are worth money. We find that subjects like receiving monetized points significantly more than non-monetized points but dislike being “poorer” than others in monetized and non-monetized points equally, suggesting relative money is valued only for the relative points it represents. We find no evidence that subjects like being “richer” than others. Subgroup analyses reveal women have a strong(er) distaste for being “richer” and “poorer” (than do men), and conservatives have a strong(er) distaste for being “poorer” (than do progressives). Our experimental-SWB approach is easy to administer and can provide some insights a revealed-preference approach cannot, suggesting that it may complement choice-based tasks in future experiments to better estimate preference parameters.
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After
John Stuart Mill claimed that “men do not desire merely to be rich, but richer than other men.” Are people made happy by being richer than others? Or are people made happy by favorable comparisons to others more generally, and being richer is merely a proxy for this ineffable relativity? We conduct an online experiment absent choice in which we measure subjective well-being (SWB) before and after an exogenous shock that reveals to subjects how many experimental points they and another subject receive, and whether or not points are worth money. We find that subjects are made significantly happier when they receive monetized rather than non-monetized points, suggesting money is valued more than the points it represents. In contrast, subjects are made equally unhappy when they receive fewer monetized points as when they receive fewer non-monetized points than others, suggesting relative money is not valued more than the relative points it represents. We find no evidence that subjects are made happier by being “richer” than others (i.e., by receiving more points—either monetized or non-monetized—than others). Subgroup analyses reveal women are made unhappier (than men) by being “richer” and “poorer” than others, and conservatives are made unhappier (than progressives) by being “poorer” than others. Our experimental-SWB approach is easy to administer and may complement choice-based tasks in future experiments to better estimate preference parameters.
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Last Published
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August 30, 2018 02:59 AM
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December 19, 2023 04:47 PM
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Final Sample Size: Total Number of Observations
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Of 1180 individuals who clicked the Qualtrics link, 128 did not complete the survey, and another 56 completed the survey but either entered an incorrect survey-completion code or none at all. So the Final Sample Size was 996.
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Final Sample Size (or Number of Clusters) by Treatment Arms
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471 were in the pts-treatment and 525 in the pts$-treatment. 132 subjects (69 in the pts-treatment and 63 in the pts$-treatment) completed at least one of the screening items incorrectly and were dropped from the analysis. The final sample size in the LL pts$ treatment was 99, in LL pts was 103, in LH pts$ was 103, in LH pts was 109, in HL pts$ was 123, in HL pts was 89, in HH pts$ was 133, in HH pts was 101.
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Is there a restricted access data set available on request?
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Yes
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Restricted Data Contact
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[email protected]
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Program Files
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No
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Is data available for public use?
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No
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Keyword(s)
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Other, Welfare
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Other, Welfare
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Building on Existing Work
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No
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