Decreasing Incomes Increase Selfishness

We use a controlled laboratory experiment to study the causal impact of income de-creases within time period on redistribution decisions at end that period, in an environment where we keep fixed sum incomes over period. First, investigate effect negative trend (intra-personal decrease), which means decreasing compared one’s recent past. Second, relative another person (inter-personal decrease). If intra-personal or inter-personal decreases create dissatisfaction for individual, may become more selfish obtain compensation. formalize both effects multi-period model augmenting standard equality aversion. Overall, conditional exhibiting sufficiently-strong social preferences, find individuals indeed behave selfishly when they experience in-comes. While many studies examine inequality decisions, delve into history behind isolate changes.