期刊名称：Discussion Papers / Norwegian School of Economics and Business Administration
印刷版ISSN：0804-6824
出版年度：2014
卷号：2014
出版社：Bergen
摘要：We report an experimental test of the four touchstones of rationality in choiceunder risk – utility maximization, stochastic dominance, expected-utility maximizationand small-stakes risk neutrality – with students from one of the bestuniversities in the United States and one of the best universities in Africa, theUniversity of Dar es Salaam. Although the US and the Tanzanian subjects comefrom different backgrounds and face different economic prospects, they are unitedby being among the most able in their societies. Importantly, many of whom willexercise an outsized influence over economic and political affairs. We find verysmall or no significant differences between the two samples in the degree of rationalityaccording to a number of standard economic measures. An alternativeapproach is to take cognitive ability (IQ) as a proxy for economic rationality. Weshow that a canonical IQ test indicates a much larger development gap in rationalityrelative to our economic tests.
