We conduct experiments on a rich set of repeated games with high discount factors ( = 0.99; 0.995) and develop two pattern-mining methods to study the long run. Our approach emphasizes learning within a repeated game and documents its consequences. Whether, how and what patterns emerge are the subjects of this paper. We find that there is more stability, more efficiency, and more equality at the end of play than at the beginning. Moreover, subjects reach more complex agreements over time. We are also able to detect typical story lines relating long run outcomes to initial play.

Social and political inequality among individuals is a common driving force behind the breakdown in cooperation. In this paper, we theoretically and experimentally study cooperation among individuals faced with a sequence of collective-action problems in which the benefits to cooperation are divided according to political power that is obtained through a contest. We have three main results. First, we find that cooperation predictably responds to the fundamental parameters of the collective-action problem. Specifically, it is increasing in the benefit to cooperation and how much benefit is gained from partial group cooperation, and decreasing in the number of players. Second, we find that when players are unrestricted in their expenditures in the contest, cooperation is much lower than when expenditures are set to a specific proportion of earnings. Finally, we find that individual norms and beliefs account for a substantial proportion of explained variance in individuals' decisions to cooperate.

This paper investigates fairness preferences for matching mechanisms. Using experiments, we let spectators choose between the strategy-proof serial dictator (SD)
mechanism and the manipulable Boston mechanism. In our school-choice setting, some students are forced to report their preferences truthfully, while others can
strategically manipulate their rank-order lists. Hence, in equilibrium, the Boston mechanism leads to justified envy while the SD mechanism does not. We find that a
majority of spectators votes for the Boston mechanism, thereby accepting outcomes where some agents have justified envy. However, some spectators consider a justified-envy free match as more fair, particularly in situations where priorities are based on earned merit. Overall, our findings indicate that a substantial share of individuals believe that strategic behavior can create its own form of entitlement.

In this paper, we investigate the effect of high incentives on behavior in the Allais paradox. In a 2x2 design, we vary the size of the incentive and whether payoffs are hypothetical or real. We run the experiment in Kenya. In the treatment with real high incentives, subjects can earn up to 5 times their median monthly wage. We find two main results. (i) Increasing real incentives leads to more violations of Expected Utility; The difference in the percentage of “safe” choices across the two lottery sets increases substantially with high incentives. (ii) Choices that are made under high real incentives are better approximated by high hypothetical than by low real incentives.