Nothing Special   »   [go: up one dir, main page]
IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/bon/boncrc/crctr224_2022_318v2.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Shallow Meritocracy

Author

Listed:
  • Peter Andre
Abstract
Meritocracies aspire to reward hard work but promise not to judge individuals by the circumstances into which they were born. However, the choice to work hard is often shaped by circumstances. I show that people’s merit judgments are insensitive to circumstances’ effect on choice. In an experiment, US participants judge how much money workers deserve for the effort they exert. Unequal circumstances discourage some workers from working hard. Nonetheless, participants hold disadvantaged workers responsible for their choices. Participants reward the effort of disadvantaged and advantaged workers identically, regardless of the circumstances under which choices are made. Additional experiments identify an important underlying mechanism. Individuals understand that choices are influenced by circumstances. But, in light of an uncertain counterfactual state – what exactly would have happened on a level playing field – individuals base their merit judgments on the only reliable evidence they possess: observed effort levels. I confirm these patterns in a structural model of fairness views. Finally, a vignette study shows that merit judgments can be similarly “shallow” when choices are shaped by racism or poverty.

Suggested Citation

  • Peter Andre, 2022. "Shallow Meritocracy," CRC TR 224 Discussion Paper Series crctr224_2022_318v2, University of Bonn and University of Mannheim, Germany.
    • Handle: RePEc:bon:boncrc:crctr224_2022_318v2
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.crctr224.de/research/discussion-papers/archive/dp318
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Peter Andrebriq & Carlo Pizzinelli & Christopher Roth & Johannes Wohlfart, 2022. "Subjective Models of the Macroeconomy: Evidence From Experts and Representative Samples," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 89(6), pages 2958-2991.
    2. Jordi Brandts & Gary Charness, 2011. "The strategy versus the direct-response method: a first survey of experimental comparisons," Experimental Economics, Springer;Economic Science Association, vol. 14(3), pages 375-398, September.
    3. Armin Falk & Fabian Kosse & Pia Pinger, 2020. "Mentoring and Schooling Decisions: Causal Evidence," CESifo Working Paper Series 8382, CESifo.
    4. Peng Ding & Avi Feller & Luke Miratrix, 2016. "Randomization inference for treatment effect variation," Journal of the Royal Statistical Society Series B, Royal Statistical Society, vol. 78(3), pages 655-671, June.
    5. Alberto Abadie, 2020. "Statistical Nonsignificance in Empirical Economics," American Economic Review: Insights, American Economic Association, vol. 2(2), pages 193-208, June.
    6. George A. Akerlof & Janet L. Yellen, 1990. "The Fair Wage-Effort Hypothesis and Unemployment," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 105(2), pages 255-283.
    7. Ilyana Kuziemko & Michael I. Norton & Emmanuel Saez & Stefanie Stantcheva, 2015. "How Elastic Are Preferences for Redistribution? Evidence from Randomized Survey Experiments," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 105(4), pages 1478-1508, April.
    8. Ingvild Almås & Alexander W. Cappelen & Bertil Tungodden, 2020. "Cutthroat Capitalism versus Cuddly Socialism: Are Americans More Meritocratic and Efficiency-Seeking than Scandinavians?," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 128(5), pages 1753-1788.
    9. Cappelen, Alexander W. & Sørensen, Erik Ø. & Tungodden, Bertil, 2010. "Responsibility for what? Fairness and individual responsibility," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 54(3), pages 429-441, April.
    10. Raj Chetty & Adam Looney & Kory Kroft, 2009. "Salience and Taxation: Theory and Evidence," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(4), pages 1145-1177, September.
    11. Alexander W. Cappelen & Astri Drange Hole & Erik Ø Sørensen & Bertil Tungodden, 2007. "The Pluralism of Fairness Ideals: An Experimental Approach," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 97(3), pages 818-827, June.
    12. Marcel Preuss & Germán Reyes & Jason Somerville & Joy Wu, 2023. "Inequality of Opportunity and Income Redistribution," CEDLAS, Working Papers 0309, CEDLAS, Universidad Nacional de La Plata.
    13. Alberto Alesina & Stefanie Stantcheva & Edoardo Teso, 2018. "Intergenerational Mobility and Preferences for Redistribution," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 108(2), pages 521-554, February.
    14. David Cesarini & Christopher T. Dawes & Magnus Johannesson & Paul Lichtenstein & Björn Wallace, 2009. "Genetic Variation in Preferences for Giving and Risk Taking," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 124(2), pages 809-842.
    15. Charness, Gary & Gneezy, Uri & Halladay, Brianna, 2016. "Experimental methods: Pay one or pay all," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 131(PA), pages 141-150.
    16. Mollerstrom, Johanna & Reme, Bjørn-Atle & Sørensen, Erik Ø., 2015. "Luck, choice and responsibility — An experimental study of fairness views," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 131(C), pages 33-40.
    17. Dmitry Taubinsky & Alex Rees-Jones, 2018. "Attention Variation and Welfare: Theory and Evidence from a Tax Salience Experiment," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 85(4), pages 2462-2496.
    18. Stefanie Stantcheva, 2021. "Understanding Tax Policy: How do People Reason?," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 136(4), pages 2309-2369.
    19. Akbaş, Merve & Ariely, Dan & Yuksel, Sevgi, 2019. "When is inequality fair? An experiment on the effect of procedural justice and agency," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 161(C), pages 114-127.
    20. Michela Carlana & Eliana La Ferrara & Paolo Pinotti, 2022. "Reply to: Comments on “Goals and Gaps: Educational Careers of Immigrant Children”," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 90(1), pages 43-46, January.
    21. Fleurbaey, Marc, 2012. "Fairness, Responsibility, and Welfare," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780199653591.
    22. Raj Chetty & Nathaniel Hendren & Lawrence F. Katz, 2016. "The Effects of Exposure to Better Neighborhoods on Children: New Evidence from the Moving to Opportunity Experiment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 106(4), pages 855-902, April.
    23. Michela Carlana & Eliana La Ferrara & Paolo Pinotti, 2022. "Goals and Gaps: Educational Careers of Immigrant Children," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 90(1), pages 1-29, January.
    24. Florian Engl, 2022. "A Theory of Causal Responsibility Attribution," CESifo Working Paper Series 9898, CESifo.
    25. Marcel Preuss & Germán Reyes & Jason Somerville & Joy Wu, 2023. "Inequality of Opportunity and Income Redistribution," CESifo Working Paper Series 10383, CESifo.
    26. Krawczyk, Michal, 2010. "A glimpse through the veil of ignorance: Equality of opportunity and support for redistribution," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 94(1-2), pages 131-141, February.
    27. A Falk & T Neuber & N Szech, 2020. "Diffusion of Being Pivotal and Immoral Outcomes," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 87(5), pages 2205-2229.
    28. Sule Alan & Seda Ertac, 2018. "Fostering Patience in the Classroom: Results from Randomized Educational Intervention," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 126(5), pages 1865-1911.
    29. Alexander W. Cappelen & Sebastian Fest & Erik O. Sorensen & Bertil Tungodden, 2022. "Choice and Personal Responsibility: What Is a Morally Relevant Choice?," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 104(5), pages 1110-1119, December.
    30. Arne Henningsen & Ott Toomet, 2011. "maxLik: A package for maximum likelihood estimation in R," Computational Statistics, Springer, vol. 26(3), pages 443-458, September.
    31. Bohren, Aislinn & Hull, Peter & Imas, Alex, 2022. "Systemic Discrimination: Theory and Measurement," CEPR Discussion Papers 17136, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    32. Brownback, Andy & Kuhn, Michael A., 2019. "Understanding outcome bias," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 342-360.
    33. Marcel Preuss & Germ'an Reyes & Jason Somerville & Joy Wu, 2022. "Inequality of Opportunity and Income Redistribution," Papers 2209.00534, arXiv.org, revised Nov 2024.
    34. Ran Spiegler, 2020. "Behavioral Implications of Causal Misperceptions," Annual Review of Economics, Annual Reviews, vol. 12(1), pages 81-106, August.
    35. Niederle, Muriel & Vespa, Emanuel, 2023. "Cognitive Limitations: Failures of Contingent Thinking," University of California at San Diego, Economics Working Paper Series qt5q14p1np, Department of Economics, UC San Diego.
    36. Ignacio Esponda Jr. & Emanuel Vespa Jr., 2014. "Hypothetical Thinking and Information Extraction in the Laboratory," American Economic Journal: Microeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 6(4), pages 180-202, November.
    37. James Konow, 2000. "Fair Shares: Accountability and Cognitive Dissonance in Allocation Decisions," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 90(4), pages 1072-1091, September.
    38. Robert H. Frank, 2016. "Success and Luck: Good Fortune and the Myth of Meritocracy," Economics Books, Princeton University Press, edition 1, number 10663.
    39. Lu Dong & Lingo Huang & Jaimie W Lien, 2022. ""They Never Had a Chance": Unequal Opportunities and Fair Redistributions," Discussion Papers 2022-11, The Centre for Decision Research and Experimental Economics, School of Economics, University of Nottingham.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Peter Andre, 2021. "Shallow Meritocracy: An Experiment on Fairness Views," CRC TR 224 Discussion Paper Series crctr224_2021_318v1, University of Bonn and University of Mannheim, Germany.
    2. Lekfuangfu, Warn N. & Powdthavee, Nattavudh & Riyanto, Yohanes E., 2023. "Luck or rights? An experiment on preferences for redistribution following inheritance of opportunity," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 106(C).
    3. Fehr, Dietmar & Müller, Daniel & Preuss, Marcel, 2024. "Social mobility perceptions and inequality acceptance," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 221(C), pages 366-384.
    4. Cappelen, Alexander W. & de Haan, Thomas & Tungodden, Bertil, 2024. "Fairness and limited information: Are people Bayesian meritocrats?," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 233(C).
    5. Cappelen, Alexander & Liu, Yiming & Nielsen, Hedda & Tungodden, Bertil, 2024. "Fairness in a Society of Unequal Opportunities," Discussion Paper Series in Economics 17/2024, Norwegian School of Economics, Department of Economics.
    6. Marcel Preuss & Germán Reyes & Jason Somerville & Joy Wu, 2023. "Inequality of Opportunity and Income Redistribution," CEDLAS, Working Papers 0309, CEDLAS, Universidad Nacional de La Plata.
    7. Marcel Preuss & Germán Reyes & Jason Somerville & Joy Wu, 2023. "Inequality of Opportunity and Income Redistribution," CESifo Working Paper Series 10383, CESifo.
    8. Alexander Cappelen & Yiming Liu & Hedda Nielsen & Bertil Tungodden, 2024. "Fairness in a Society of Unequal Opportunities," Rationality and Competition Discussion Paper Series 506, CRC TRR 190 Rationality and Competition.
    9. David Hope & Julian Limberg & Nina Weber, 2023. "Technological Change, Task Complexity, and Preferences for Redistribution," ifo Working Paper Series 398, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich.
    10. Lu, Kelin, 2024. "Silver Spoons and Scales of Justice: The Fairness Preference over Unequal Intergenerational Wealth Transfers," MPRA Paper 121232, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    11. Nina Weber, 2023. "Prosocial Risk-Taking: Growing the Pie or Increasing your Slice?," ifo Working Paper Series 399, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich.
    12. Christine L. Exley & Judd B. Kessler, 2018. "Equity Concerns are Narrowly Framed," NBER Working Papers 25326, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    13. Preuss, Marcel & Reyes, Germán & Somerville, Jason & Wu, Joy, 2024. "Inequality of Opportunity and Income Redistribution," IZA Discussion Papers 17155, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    14. Ingvild Almås & Alexander W. Cappelen & Bertil Tungodden, 2020. "Cutthroat Capitalism versus Cuddly Socialism: Are Americans More Meritocratic and Efficiency-Seeking than Scandinavians?," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 128(5), pages 1753-1788.
    15. Jeffrey, Karen & Matakos, Konstantinos, 2024. "Automation anxiety, fairness perceptions, and redistribution: Past experiences condition the response to future job loss," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 221(C), pages 174-190.
    16. Marcel Preuss & Germ'an Reyes & Jason Somerville & Joy Wu, 2022. "Inequality of Opportunity and Income Redistribution," Papers 2209.00534, arXiv.org, revised Nov 2024.
    17. Preuss, Marcel & Reyes, Germán & Somerville, Jason & Wu, Joy, 2022. "Inequality of Opportunity and Income Redistribution," VfS Annual Conference 2022 (Basel): Big Data in Economics 264138, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    18. Jeffrey, Karen, 2021. "Automation and the future of work: How rhetoric shapes the response in policy preferences," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 192(C), pages 417-433.
    19. Marcel Preuss & Germán Reyes & Jason Somerville & Joy Wu, 2024. "Inequality of Opportunity and Income Redistribution," CRC TR 224 Discussion Paper Series crctr224_2024_491, University of Bonn and University of Mannheim, Germany.
    20. Lu, Kelin, 2024. "Silver Spoons and Scales of Justice: The Fairness Preference over Unequal Intergenerational Wealth Transfers," MPRA Paper 121451, University Library of Munich, Germany.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Meritocracy; fairness; responsibility; attitudes toward inequality; redistribution; social preferences; inference; uncertainty; counterfactual thinking;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • C91 - Mathematical and Quantitative Methods - - Design of Experiments - - - Laboratory, Individual Behavior
    • D63 - Microeconomics - - Welfare Economics - - - Equity, Justice, Inequality, and Other Normative Criteria and Measurement
    • D91 - Microeconomics - - Micro-Based Behavioral Economics - - - Role and Effects of Psychological, Emotional, Social, and Cognitive Factors on Decision Making
    • H23 - Public Economics - - Taxation, Subsidies, and Revenue - - - Externalities; Redistributive Effects; Environmental Taxes and Subsidies

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:bon:boncrc:crctr224_2022_318v2. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: CRC Office (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.crctr224.de .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.