| dc.description.abstract | Choices involving risk significantly affect the distribution of income and
wealth in society, but there is probably no more contentious question of
justice than how to allocate the gains and losses that inevitably result from
risky choices. This paper reports the results from the first experiment, to
our knowledge, to study fairness views about risk-taking, where the main
aim is to examine whether people's fairness considerations mainly focus on
ex ante opportunities or ex post outcomes. The experiment was a two stage
dictator game where the distribution phase was preceded by a risk-taking
phase. Our analysis provides four main findings. First, we show that
even though many participants focus exclusively on ex ante opportunities,
the majority favors some redistribution ex post. Second, we find that,
among the participants who redistribute ex post, a substantial share make
a distinction between ex post inequalities that reflect differences in luck
and ex post inequalities that reflect differences in choices. Third, we show
that the appeal of the ex ante view is independent of how costly it is to
avoid exposure to risk. Fourth, we find that the choices of stakeholders
and impartial spectators reflect the same set of fairness considerations. | en |
