When Fair Isn’t Fair: Understanding Choice Reversals Involving Social Preferences

In settings with uncertainty, tension exists between ex ante and ex post notions of fairness. Subjects in an experiment most commonly select the ex ante fair alternative ex ante and switch to the ex post fair alternative ex post. One potential explanation embraces consequentialism and construes reve...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:The Journal of political economy 2020-05, Vol.128 (5), p.1673-1711
Main Authors: Andreoni, James, Aydin, Deniz, Barton, Blake, Bernheim, B. Douglas, Naecker, Jeffrey
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Consequentialism
Economic theory
Ethics
Inconsistency
Political economy
Uncertainty
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Summary:In settings with uncertainty, tension exists between ex ante and ex post notions of fairness. Subjects in an experiment most commonly select the ex ante fair alternative ex ante and switch to the ex post fair alternative ex post. One potential explanation embraces consequentialism and construes reversals as time inconsistent. Another abandons consequentialism in favor of deontological (rule-based) ethics and thereby avoids the implication that revisions imply inconsistency. We test these explanations by examining contingent planning and the demand for commitment. Our findings suggest that the most common attitude toward fairness involves a time-consistent preference for applying a naive deontological heuristic.
ISSN:0022-3808
1537-534X
DOI:10.1086/705549