The trade-off between Ex Ante Pareto and Ex Post Egalitarianism : a study of extended paternalism in distributive choices

Abstract

In this paper, we use an experimental approach to investigate the well-known tension between equality in society and individual freedom of choice. We have conducted a large-scale international experiment with nationally representative samples from Norway and the United States to create a situation that forces the participants to make a choice between respecting two other people’s preferences or implement equality. We find that in Norway, 74.8 % of the participants put more weight on equality rather than respecting people’s preferences, and they thereby choose equality at the expense of individual freedom. The corresponding number in the United States is 61.8 %, indicating that there are differences in preferences between the two countries.