Publications

Forthcoming
Article

Social Security and Trends in Wealth Inequality

By: Sylvain Catherine, Max Miller and Natasha Sarin

Recent influential work finds large increases in inequality in the U.S. based on measures of wealth concentration that notably exclude the value of social insurance programs. This paper shows that top wealth shares have not changed much over the last three decades when... View Details

Keywords: Wealth; Equality and Inequality; Taxation; Insurance; Welfare

29 Aug 2022
Op-Ed

Income Inequality Is Rising. Are We Even Measuring It Correctly?

finding ways to reduce inequality to create a more just and equal society for all. In making decisions on how to best intervene, policymakers commonly rely on the Gini coefficient, a statistical measure of... View Details

Keywords: by Jon M. Jachimowicz, Kristin Blesch, and Oliver P. Hauser

Article

The Deception Spiral: Corporate Obfuscation Leads to Perceptions of Immorality and Cheating Behavior

By: D.M. Markowitz, M. Kouchaki, J.T. Hancock and F. Gino

In four studies, we evaluated how corporate misconduct relates to language patterns, perceptions of immorality, and unethical behavior. First, we analyzed nearly 190 codes of conduct from S&P 500 manufacturing companies and observed that corporations with ethics... View Details

Keywords: Obfuscation; Corporate Unethicality; Deception; Deception Spiral; Organizations; Values and Beliefs; Ethics; Perception; Behavior

04 Dec 2018
News

Larry Summers: urban-rural inequality and the importance of work

Article

The Bittersweet Feeling of Success: An Examination of Social Perception in Negotiation

By: L. Thompson, K. L. McGinn and R. M. Kramer

Keywords: Success; Perception; Negotiation

June 23, 2020
Article

Inequality in Socially Permissible Consumption

By: Serena Hagerty and Kate Barasz

Lower-income individuals are frequently criticized for their consumption decisions; this research examines why. Eleven preregistered studies document systematic differences in permissible consumption—interpersonal judgments about what is acceptable (or not) for others... View Details

Keywords: Interpersonal Judgments; Consumption; Economic Inequalty; Income; Equality and Inequality; Spending; Judgments

While current levels of economic inequality in Africa receive ample attention from academics and policymakers, we know little about the long-run evolution of inequality in the region. Even the new and influential ‘global inequality literature’ that is associated... View Details

2008
Working Paper

Accountability and Inequality in Single-Party Regimes: A Comparative Analysis of Vietnam and China

Over the past two decades, no two economies have averaged more rapid economic growth than China and Vietnam. But while China's income inequality has risen rapidly over that same time frame, Vietnam's has only grown moderately. Structural and socio-cultural determinants... View Details

Keywords: Income Characteristics; Economic Growth; Policy; Government and Politics; Equality and Inequality; China; Viet Nam

2003
Article

Do Incentives Work? The Perception of A Worldwide Sample of Senior Executives

By: Michael Beer and Nancy Katz

Keywords: Motivation and Incentives; Management; Perception

Why are some teams more effective than others at using their members' expertise to achieve short-term performance and longer term developmental benefits? We propose that a critical factor is expertise dissensus-members' differing perceptions of each other's level of... View Details

Task Segregation as a Mechanism for Within-job Inequality

In this article, we examine a case of task segregation—when a group of workers is disproportionately allocated, relative to other groups, to spend more time on specific tasks in a given job—and argue that such segregation is a potential mechanism for generating... View Details

September 2014
Article

Income Inequality and Social Preferences for Redistribution and Compensation Differentials

By: William R. Kerr

In cross-sectional studies, countries with greater income inequality typically exhibit less support for government-led redistribution and greater acceptance of wage inequality (e.g., United States versus Western Europe). If individual nations evolve along this pattern,... View Details

Keywords: Equality and Inequality; Income; Government and Politics

20 Jan 2012
Working Paper Summaries

Income Inequality and Social Preferences for Redistribution and Compensation Differentials

Keywords: by William R. Kerr

04 Dec 2018
Podcast

Larry Summers: Urban-rural inequality and the importance of work

Examining the realities of rural America, Larry Summers concludes that the problem is not just one of providing people with incomes—it’s about the very basic human connection between work and satisfaction. Speaking with Bill, Summers advocates “employer subsidies” to... View Details

July 2011
Article

Institutions and Inequality in Single Party Regimes: A Comparative Analysis of Vietnam and China

Despite the fact that China and Vietnam have been the world's two fastest growing economies over the past two decades, their income inequality patterns are very different. In this paper, we take a deep look at political institutions in the two countries, demonstrating... View Details

Keywords: Equality and Inequality; Developing Countries and Economies; Motivation and Incentives; Government and Politics; Policy; Power and Influence; Decision Making; Income; China; Viet Nam

July 2021
Article

How Trust and Distrust Shape Perception and Memory

By: Ann-Christin Posten and Francesca Gino

Trust is a key ingredient in decision making, as it allows us to rely on the information we receive. Although trust is usually viewed as a positive element of decision making, we suggest that its effects on memory are costly rather than beneficial. Across nine studies... View Details

Keywords: Distrust; Memory; Similarity; Misinformation; Trust; Perception; Decision Making

2014
Working Paper

I'm Just Passionate: Managing Perceptions of Distress in the Workplace

By: E.B. Wolf, A.W. Brooks, J. Lee and S. Sah

09 Sep 2015
News

Survey: US more competitive globally, but inequality a risk

January 2023
Article

Inequality Regimes in Sub-Saharan Africa from Precolonial Times to the Present

By: Ewout Frankema, Michiel de Haas and Marlous van Waijenburg

While current levels of economic inequality in Sub-Saharan Africa receive ample attention from academics and policymakers, we know little about the long-run evolution of inequality in the region. Even the new and influential ‘global inequality literature’ that is... View Details

Keywords: Economic Inequalty; Equality and Inequality; History; Africa