Abstract
Economic theory often cites the existence of goods with externalities as justification for government intervention, either as taxation to fund goods with positive externalities which would otherwise be underprovided, or as regulation on goods with negative externalities which would otherwise be overprovided. A series of experiments tests these predictions of under- or over-provision. This article describes the landscape of public goods experiments, identifying similarities and differences between them and summarizing the broad findings.
Keywords
- Altruism
- Common pool resource game
- Cooperation
- Coordination
- Externalities
- Learning
- Linear public goods game
- Other-regarding preferences
- Prisoner’s Dilemma
- Production functions
- Provision point mechanism
- Public good experiments
- Public goods
- Reciprocity
- Rent seeking
- Repeated games
- Self-interest
- Social cost
- Tragedy of the commons
- Voluntary contribution mechanism
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Croson, R.T.A. (2018). Public Goods Experiments. In: The New Palgrave Dictionary of Economics. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95189-5_2159
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-349-95189-5_2159
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