Competition and Well-Being
55 Pages Posted: 19 Jun 2006
There are 2 versions of this paper
Competition and Well-Being
Date Written: March 2006
Abstract
This paper experimentally studies the effects of competition in an environment where people's actions can not be contractually fixed. We find that, in comparison with no competition, the presence of competition does neither increase efficiency nor does it yield any gains in earnings for the short side of the exchange relation. Moreover, competition has a clearly negative impact on the disposition towards others and on the experienced well-being of those on the long side. Since subjective well-being improves only for those on the short side competition contributes to larger inequalities in experienced well-being. All in all competition does not show up as a positive force in our environment.
Keywords: Competition, happiness, well-being, laboratory experiment, emotions, market interaction
JEL Classification: A13, C92, D30, J50, M50
Suggested Citation: Suggested Citation
Do you have negative results from your research you’d like to share?
Recommended Papers
-
Relational Contracts and the Nature of Market Interactions
By Martin Brown, Armin Falk, ...
-
Truth or Consequences: An Experiment
By Jordi Brandts and Gary Charness
-
Do Labour Market Conditions Affect Gift Exchange? Some Experimental Evidence
By Jordi Brandts and Gary Charness
-
Contractual Incompleteness and the Nature of Market Interactions
By Martin Brown, Armin Falk, ...
-
Contractual Incompleteness and the Nature of Market Interactions
By Martin Brown, Armin Falk, ...
-
Putting Reciprocity to Work - Positive Versus Negative Responses in the Field
By Sebastian Kube, Michel André Maréchal, ...
-
A Behavioral Account of the Labor Market: The Role of Fairness Concerns
By Ernst Fehr, Lorenz Goette, ...
-
A Behavioral Account of the Labor Market: The Role of Fairness Concerns
By Ernst Fehr, Lorenz Goette, ...