Envy and Compassion in Tournaments Many experiments indicate that most individuals are not purely motivated by material self interest, but also care about the well being of others. In this paper we examine tournaments among inequity averse agents, who dislike disadvantageous inequity (envy) and advantageous inequity (compassion). It turns out that inequity averse agents exert higher effort leve...

Researchers have suggested that viewing social inequity as dominant-group privilege (rather than subordinate-group disadvantage) enhances dominant-group members' support for social policies aimed at lessening such inequity. However, because viewing inequity as dominant-group privilege can be damaging to dominant-group members' self-images, this perspective is frequently resisted. In the researc...

Two central principles that guide resource-allocation decisions are equity (providing equal pay for equal work) and efficiency (not wasting resources). When these two principles conflict with one another, people will often waste resources to avoid inequity. We suggest that people wish to avoid inequity not because they find it inherently unfair, but because they want to avoid the appearance of ...

Freedman and Eraser's (1966) suggestion that self-percept may affect the likelihood that individuals will act on an attitude was investigated. The probability of subjects' complying with Experimenter 2's request to distribute anti-air-pollution leaflets was assessed following Experimenter 1's manipulation of high or low payment ($1.50 or $10) and feedback to subjects indicating they (a) had a "...

This paper presents the results of an eight-country comparative study of equity in the delivery of health care. Equity is taken to mean that persons in equal need of health care should be treated the same, irrespective of their income. Two methods are used to investigate inequity: an index of inequity based on standardized expenditure shares, and a regression-based test. The results suggest tha...

Optimal Incentive Contracts under Inequity Aversion We analyze the Moral Hazard problem, assuming that agents are inequity averse. Our results differ from conventional contract theory and are more in line with empirical findings than standard results. We find: First, inequity aversion alters the structure of optimal contracts. Second, there is a strong tendency towards linear sharing rules. Thi...

We propose a method of measuring and decomposing inequity in health care utilisation that allows for heterogeneity in the use-need relationship. This makes explicit inequity that derives from unequal treatment response to variation in need, as well as that due to differential effects of non-need determinants. Under plausible conditions concerning heterogeneity in the use-need relationship and t...

We provide the first systematic study of the robustness of parameter estimates for the Fehr-Schmidt (1999) model of inequity aversion with respect to (i) the occurrence of efficiency concerns; (ii) the scale of payoffs; and (iii) the game used (i.e., cross-game consistency). Moreover, we provide evidence of a bias in the estimates that occurs if one does not correct for strategic considerations...

Background Recent healthcare literature points to the need to investigate how to achieve inequity reduction. We studied the implementation of an organizational-wide inequity reduction intervention in Israel’s largest healthcare provider and insurer, Clalit Health Services during 20092012. The intervention focused on reducing health and healthcare gaps between 55 target clinics (major clinics se...