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Loss Aversion and the Welfare Ranking of Policy Interventions

Author

Listed:
  • Firpo, Sergio

    (Insper, São Paulo)

  • Galvao, Antonio F.

    (University of Arizona)

  • Kobus, Martyna

    (Institute of Economics, Polish Academy of Sciences)

  • Parker, Thomas

    (University of Waterloo)

  • Rosa-Dias, Pedro

    (Imperial College London)

Abstract
In this paper we develop theoretical criteria and econometric methods to rank policy interventions in terms of welfare when individuals are loss-averse. The new criterion for "loss aversion-sensitive dominance" defines a weak partial ordering of the distributions of policy-induced gains and losses. It applies to the class of welfare functions which model individual preferences with non-decreasing and loss-averse attitudes towards changes in outcomes. We also develop new statistical methods to test loss aversion-sensitive dominance in practice, using nonparametric plug-in estimates. We establish the limiting distributions of uniform test statistics by showing that they are directionally differentiable. This implies that inference can be conducted by a special resampling procedure. Since point-identification of the distribution of policy-induced gains and losses may require very strong assumptions, we also extend comparison criteria, test statistics, and resampling procedures to a partially-identified case. Finally, we illustrate our methods with an empirical application to welfare comparison of two income support programs.

Suggested Citation

  • Firpo, Sergio & Galvao, Antonio F. & Kobus, Martyna & Parker, Thomas & Rosa-Dias, Pedro, 2020. "Loss Aversion and the Welfare Ranking of Policy Interventions," IZA Discussion Papers 13176, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    • Handle: RePEc:iza:izadps:dp13176
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    welfare; loss aversion; policy evaluation; stochastic ordering; directional differentiability;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C12 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods and Methodology: General - - - Hypothesis Testing: General
    • C14 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Econometric and Statistical Methods and Methodology: General - - - Semiparametric and Nonparametric Methods: General
    • I30 - Health, Education, and Welfare - - Welfare, Well-Being, and Poverty - - - General

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