What Do Workers Want From (Private) Government? Experimental Evidence from the United States

Last registered on May 26, 2020
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Pre-Trial

Trial Information

General Information

Title
What Do Workers Want From (Private) Government? Experimental Evidence from the United States
RCT ID
AEARCTR-0005777
Initial registration date
April 28, 2020

Initial registration date is when the trial was registered.

It corresponds to when the registration was submitted to the Registry to be reviewed for publication.

First published
April 28, 2020, 10:56 AM EDT

First published corresponds to when the trial was first made public on the Registry after being reviewed.

Last updated
May 26, 2020, 10:40 PM EDT

Last updated is the most recent time when changes to the trial's registration were published.

Locations

Country
United States of America
Region

Primary Investigator

Name
Soumyajit Mazumder
Affiliation
Contact Primary Investigator

Other Primary Investigator(s)

Additional Trial Information

Status
In development
Start date
2020-05-27
End date
2020-06-30
Keywords
Firms & Productivity, Governance, Labor
Additional Keywords
JEL code(s)
J54, J30
Secondary IDs
Abstract
Much of the American labor force spends time in ``private governments" over which they have little say during and beyond the work day. Do Americans prefer to work for businesses that look more like democracies or autocracies? We study this question using conjoint experimental techniques on a nationally representative sample of Americans. This design allows us to vary a large number of features of the workplace--especially their governance structures and the degree to which these structures allow for meaningful democratic decision-making. We hypothesize that workers should have a preference for democratic corporate governance structures such as employee ownership, co-determination, and the direct election of management especially so after experimentally manipulating class identity. The results of this project will contribute to literatures across management, economic sociology, and political science by empirically investigating the problem of the ``corporate regime type" from the bottom-up.
External Link(s)

Registration Citation

Citation
Mazumder, Soumyajit. 2020. "What Do Workers Want From (Private) Government? Experimental Evidence from the United States." AEA RCT Registry. May 26. https://doi.org/10.1257/rct.5777-1.1
Sponsors & Partners
Experimental Details

Interventions

Intervention(s)
Intervention Start Date
2020-06-05
Intervention End Date
2020-06-30

Primary Outcomes

Primary Outcomes (end points)
After reading the firm profiles, respondents answer five outcomes measures. The first question forces respondents to indicate at which firm they would rather work. We code the responses to the question as a binary variable, \textit{Firm Preferred}, which is 1 if the firm is preferred and 1 otherwise. This is our key dependent variable. This variable approximates the real labor market in that when someone accepts a job offer, they must reject the other offer. We then use two outcome variables to measure whether respondents believe that more democratic workplaces improve their day-to-day work experiences. We ask respondents which firm is ``best at resolving any problems or complaints that arise at work'' and at which firm they think ``workers would have more power.'' Both measures are forced choice. Additionally, we ask respondents at which firm they think they would have more responsibilities to see whether workers realize that more democratic workplaces would require them to take on some managerial responsibilities. Finally, we include an open-ended question for respondents to express why they prefer one firm over the other. This question helps us capture any other reasons that we might miss.
Primary Outcomes (explanation)

Secondary Outcomes

Secondary Outcomes (end points)
Secondary Outcomes (explanation)

Experimental Design

Experimental Design
We use a conjoint survey to attain a comprehensive sense for Americans' preferences toward the workplace. Each respondent evaluates four comparisons between pairs of firms, each displayed on a new page. We randomly vary the two firms' profiles of 19 attributes that one would might consider when choosing between job offers. From this, we aim to estimate the Average Marginal Component Effect (AMCE), which is the marginal contribution of each attribute on the outcome of interest.
Experimental Design Details
Randomization Method
We randomize conjoint attributes with all combinations having equal probability.
Randomization Unit
Individual
Was the treatment clustered?
No

Experiment Characteristics

Sample size: planned number of clusters
1000
Sample size: planned number of observations
4000
Sample size (or number of clusters) by treatment arms
Treatment arms are factorial design so many treatment arm cells are empty. The quantity of interest is the AMCE which can be unbiasedly estimated despite the presence of empty cells via ordinary least squares.
Minimum detectable effect size for main outcomes (accounting for sample design and clustering)
Supporting Documents and Materials
IRB

Institutional Review Boards (IRBs)

IRB Name
Princeton University Institutional Review Board
IRB Approval Date
2020-04-20
IRB Approval Number
IRB# 12814
IRB Name
Harvard University Area Institutional Review Board
IRB Approval Date
2020-04-14
IRB Approval Number
IRB19-1289
Analysis Plan

Analysis Plan Documents

YouGov Study Sample

MD5: e7b7bfcb379382bc3c472143a83e861b

SHA1: d40ed249863b41f51a9c268f7470648d349c2209

Uploaded At: May 26, 2020

mazumder-yan-wd-worker-pref-pilot-v1.pdf

MD5: 167faa15a5b48a79a64b8cd725f9a69b

SHA1: f7c7f9d5c52551dbcd3c04299fa98f9ff6cb6ee9

Uploaded At: April 28, 2020

Post-Trial

Post Trial Information

Study Withdrawal

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Intervention

Is the intervention completed?
No
Data Collection Complete
Data Publication

Data Publication

Is public data available?
No

Program Files

Program Files
Reports, Papers & Other Materials

Relevant Paper(s)

Reports & Other Materials