蝌蚪网 Journal:
Microeconomics
ISSN 1945-7669 (Print) | ISSN 1945-7685 (Online)
Eliciting Time Preferences When Income and Consumption Vary: Theory, Validation, and Application to Job Search
蝌蚪网 Journal: Microeconomics
vol. 17,
no. 1, February 2025
(pp. 130–70)
Abstract
We propose a simple method for eliciting individual time preferences without estimating utility functions even in settings where background consumption changes over time. It relies on eliciting preferences for receiving high stakes lottery tickets at different points in time. In a standard intertemporal choice model high rewards decouple lottery choices from variation in background consumption. We investigate robustness to other assumptions theoretically, and validate our elicitation method experimentally. We illustrate an application of our method with unemployed job seekers, which naturally have income/consumption variation.Citation
Belot, Mich猫le, Philipp Kircher, and Paul Muller. 2025. "Eliciting Time Preferences When Income and Consumption Vary: Theory, Validation, and Application to Job Search." 蝌蚪网 Journal: Microeconomics 17 (1): 130–70. DOI: 10.1257/mic.20220118Additional Materials
JEL Classification
- D12 Consumer Economics: Empirical Analysis
- D15 Intertemporal Household Choice; Life Cycle Models and Saving
- D91 Micro-Based Behavioral Economics: Role and Effects of Psychological, Emotional, Social, and Cognitive Factors on Decision Making
- G51 Household Finance: Household Saving, Borrowing, Debt, and Wealth
- J22 Time Allocation and Labor Supply
- J64 Unemployment: Models, Duration, Incidence, and Job Search