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 | A409, Dauphine |
Politicians’ Social Welfare Criteria: An Experiment With German Legislators with Sebastian Blesse, Philipp Doerrenberg, Christoph Feldhaus, Axel Ockenfels
Much economic analysis derives policy recommendations based on social welfare criteria intended to model policymakers’ preferences. Yet, little is known about policymakers’ normative views suitable to this use. Our behavioral experiment elicits German legislators’ welfare criteria. When resolving prefer-
ence conflicts across individuals, they place substantially more importance on least-favored alternatives than on most-favored alternatives, contrasting with common aggregation mechanisms and the equal weighting inherent in utilitarianism. When resolving preference conflicts within individuals, politicians
choose inconsistently with behavioral economists’ most common approach to welfare analysis with time-inconsistent preferences. In distribution, politicians largely support the same welfare criteria as the public.
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