Working Papers
Redistribution and Moral Wiggle Room (with Alexander Cappelen, Elena Cettolin, Sigrid Suetens, and Bertil Tungodden)
Draft available soon.
We investigate to what extent individuals sacrifice their normative principles of redistribution to accommodate their discriminatory tastes. We conduct experiments with large samples of the German and French majority population, where respondents have the possibility to redistribute money between two individuals, of which one belongs to an ethnic minority group. To examine how normative principles can be selectively applied in this context, we design two types of treatments: one where a clear normative benchmark is available, and another where different allocations can be justified by appealing to various principles. Such a plurality of principles creates moral wiggle room, the possibility to endorse a principle because it aligns with one’s discriminatory preferences. We find that individuals with a minority background are discriminated against, but the presence of moral wiggle room does not increase the extent of discrimination.
Double Redistribution Standards (with Sigrid Suetens)
This paper investigates whether in Germany and France double standards are used when compensating income inequalities due to differences in productivity. To do so, controlled experiments were conducted among general-population samples in which decision makers belonging to the majority group were confronted with an unequal distribution of income between two persons of which one belonged to the majority and the other to an ethnic minority group. One of these persons performed well in a productive task and the other performed poorly. On average, less money was redistributed from rich, well-performing majority to poor, poorly-performing minority persons than from rich, well-performing minority to poor, poorly-performing majority persons, providing evidence of a double meritocratic standard. The effect is driven by those decision makers who hold a negative attitude to ethnic diversity and vote for far-right political parties or not vote at all.
The Effect of Female Political Representation on Child Marriage and Adolescent Fertility: Evidence from Rural India
In this paper, I investigate the effect of increased female political representation on child marriage and adolescent fertility rates by utilizing a large-scale natural experiment in rural India. Using state-level variation in the timing of a policy change, I find that increased representation of women in local governance led to a significant reduction in both of these practices. In addition, I find that these reductions were accompanied by significant improvements in girls’ schooling outcomes. Anecdotal evidence suggests that one of the main mechanisms behind the findings is women leaders’ tailored policy-making and awareness-raising efforts at low levels of local governance.
The Economics of Vulnerability (with Patricio S. Dalton and Sayantan Ghosal)
Draft available soon.
This paper incorporates concerns about feeling vulnerable into an economic framework. In our setting, individuals with vulnerability concerns feel exposed when interacting with an institution that lacks a "safe" action—one that guarantees a minimum standard of respectful and dignified treatment. First, we provide an axiomatic characterization of choice functions consistent with vulnerability concerns. Second, we illustrate how these concerns influence decisions in the labor market, demonstrating that the absence of safe actions leads to higher wage thresholds for participation—even when these actions would not have been chosen if available. Third, we measure the cost of feeling vulnerable through an online experiment and find evidence of an intrinsic value for a "safe" action, even in contexts where mistreatment is not an equilibrium outcome and after controlling for risk perceptions and preferences.
Work in Progress
Anticipated Gender Discrimination and Human Capital Investment (with Selin Arslanoglu)
Racial Diversity and Redistribution (with Sigrid Suetens)