IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/jeborg/v99y2014icp1-17.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

How many pears would a pear packer pack if a pear packer could pack pears at quasi-exogenously varying piece rates?

Author

Listed:
  • Chang, Tom
  • Gross, Tal

Abstract

We examine labor supply using a unique dataset collected from a large pear-packing factory. Pear packers face both expected and unexpected shocks to their wages, and we use this to evaluate different models of inter-temporal labor supply. We find strong evidence for reference-dependent preferences, but only mixed support for models of rational-expectations-based targets.

Suggested Citation

  • Chang, Tom & Gross, Tal, 2014. "How many pears would a pear packer pack if a pear packer could pack pears at quasi-exogenously varying piece rates?," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 99(C), pages 1-17.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:jeborg:v:99:y:2014:i:c:p:1-17
    DOI: 10.1016/j.jebo.2013.11.001
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167268113002953
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.jebo.2013.11.001?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Colin Camerer & Linda Babcock & George Loewenstein & Richard Thaler, 1997. "Labor Supply of New York City Cabdrivers: One Day at a Time," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 112(2), pages 407-441.
    2. Johannes Abeler & Armin Falk & Lorenz Goette & David Huffman, 2011. "Reference Points and Effort Provision," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(2), pages 470-492, April.
    3. Canice Prendergast, 1999. "The Provision of Incentives in Firms," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 37(1), pages 7-63, March.
    4. Vincent P. Crawford & Juanjuan Meng, 2011. "New York City Cab Drivers' Labor Supply Revisited: Reference-Dependent Preferences with Rational-Expectations Targets for Hours and Income," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(5), pages 1912-1932, August.
    5. Botond Kőszegi & Matthew Rabin, 2006. "A Model of Reference-Dependent Preferences," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 121(4), pages 1133-1165.
    6. Amos Tversky & Daniel Kahneman, 1991. "Loss Aversion in Riskless Choice: A Reference-Dependent Model," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 106(4), pages 1039-1061.
    7. Edward P. Lazear, 2000. "Performance Pay and Productivity," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 90(5), pages 1346-1361, December.
    8. Oriana Bandiera & Iwan Barankay & Imran Rasul, 2010. "Social Incentives in the Workplace," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 77(2), pages 417-458.
    9. Alexandre Mas & Enrico Moretti, 2009. "Peers at Work," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(1), pages 112-145, March.
    10. John A. List, 2011. "Does Market Experience Eliminate Market Anomalies? The Case of Exogenous Market Experience," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(3), pages 313-317, May.
    11. Daniel Kahneman & Amos Tversky, 2013. "Prospect Theory: An Analysis of Decision Under Risk," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Leonard C MacLean & William T Ziemba (ed.), HANDBOOK OF THE FUNDAMENTALS OF FINANCIAL DECISION MAKING Part I, chapter 6, pages 99-127, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    12. David Gill & Victoria Prowse, 2012. "A Structural Analysis of Disappointment Aversion in a Real Effort Competition," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(1), pages 469-503, February.
    13. Ernst Fehr & Lorenz Goette, 2007. "Do Workers Work More if Wages Are High? Evidence from a Randomized Field Experiment," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 97(1), pages 298-317, March.
    14. Gerald S. Oettinger, 1999. "An Empirical Analysis of the Daily Labor Supply of Stadium Vendors," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 107(2), pages 360-392, April.
    15. Devin G. Pope & Maurice E. Schweitzer, 2011. "Is Tiger Woods Loss Averse? Persistent Bias in the Face of Experience, Competition, and High Stakes," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(1), pages 129-157, February.
    16. Chou, Y.K., 2000. "Testing Alternative Models of Labor Supply. Evidence from Taxi-Drivers in Singapore," Department of Economics - Working Papers Series 768, The University of Melbourne.
    17. Dickinson, David L, 1999. "An Experimental Examination of Labor Supply and Work Intensities," Journal of Labor Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 17(4), pages 638-670, October.
    18. Henry S. Farber, 2008. "Reference-Dependent Preferences and Labor Supply: The Case of New York City Taxi Drivers," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 98(3), pages 1069-1082, June.
    19. Harry J. Paarsch & Bruce S. Shearer, 1999. "The Response of Worker Effort to Piece Rates: Evidence from the British Columbia Tree-Planting Industry," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 34(4), pages 643-667.
    20. Henry S. Farber, 2005. "Is Tomorrow Another Day? The Labor Supply of New York City Cabdrivers," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 113(1), pages 46-82, February.
    21. George J. Borjas, 1980. "The Relationship between Wages and Weekly Hours of Work: The Role of Division Bias," Journal of Human Resources, University of Wisconsin Press, vol. 15(3), pages 409-423.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Ku, Hyejin, 2019. "The effect of wage subsidies on piece rate workers: Evidence from the Penny Per Pound program in Florida," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 139(C), pages 122-134.
    2. Brodeur, Abel & Nield, Kerry, 2018. "An empirical analysis of taxi, Lyft and Uber rides: Evidence from weather shocks in NYC," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 152(C), pages 1-16.
    3. Guiteras, Raymond P. & Jack, B. Kelsey, 2018. "Productivity in piece-rate labor markets: Evidence from rural Malawi," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 131(C), pages 42-61.
    4. Nguyen, Ha Trong & Duncan, Alan S, 2017. "Exchange rate fluctuations and immigrants' labour market outcomes: New evidence from Australian household panel data," Journal of International Economics, Elsevier, vol. 105(C), pages 174-186.
    5. Barbos, Andrei & Kaisen, Joshua, 2022. "An Example of Negative Wage Elasticity for YouTube Content Creators," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 203(C), pages 382-400.
    6. Jose Rojas-Fallas & J. Forrest Williams, 2020. "Wage Differences Matter: An Experiment of Social Comparison and Effort Provision when Wages Increase or Decrease," Games, MDPI, vol. 11(4), pages 1-12, December.
    7. Cadsby, C. Bram & Song, Fei & Zubanov, Nick, 2024. "Working more for more and working more for less: Labor supply in the gain and loss domains," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(C).
    8. Henry S. Farber, 2014. "Why You Can't Find a Taxi in the Rain and Other Labor Supply Lessons from Cab Drivers," Working Papers 583a, Princeton University, Department of Economics, Industrial Relations Section..
    9. Stephen F. Hamilton & Timothy J. Richards & Aric P. Shafran & Kathryn N. Vasilaky, 2022. "Farm labor productivity and the impact of mechanization," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 104(4), pages 1435-1459, August.
    10. Tom Chang & Joshua Graff Zivin & Tal Gross & Matthew Neidell, 2016. "Particulate Pollution and the Productivity of Pear Packers," American Economic Journal: Economic Policy, American Economic Association, vol. 8(3), pages 141-169, August.
    11. Hammarlund, Cecilia, 2018. "A trip to reach the target? – The labor supply of Swedish Baltic cod fishermen," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 75(C), pages 1-11.
    12. Timothy J. Richards, 2020. "Income Targeting and Farm Labor Supply," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 102(2), pages 419-438, March.
    13. Alessandro Saia, 2022. "Trouble Underground: Demand Shocks and the Labor Supply Behavior of New York City Taxi Drivers," Italian Economic Journal: A Continuation of Rivista Italiana degli Economisti and Giornale degli Economisti, Springer;Società Italiana degli Economisti (Italian Economic Association), vol. 8(1), pages 1-27, March.
    14. Lollo, Niklas & O’Rourke, Dara, 2018. "Productivity, Profits, and Pay: A Field Experiment Analyzing the Impacts of Compensation Systems in an Apparel Factory," Institute for Research on Labor and Employment, Working Paper Series qt31c4j2hz, Institute of Industrial Relations, UC Berkeley.
    15. Dupas, Pascaline & Robinson, Jonathan & Saavedra, Santiago, 2020. "The daily grind: Cash needs and labor supply," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 177(C), pages 399-414.
    16. Beshir, H.A.; & Fichera, E.;, 2022. "“And Breathe Normally†: The Low Emission Zone impacts on health and well-being in England," Health, Econometrics and Data Group (HEDG) Working Papers 22/09, HEDG, c/o Department of Economics, University of York.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Charness, Gary & Kuhn, Peter, 2011. "Lab Labor: What Can Labor Economists Learn from the Lab?," Handbook of Labor Economics, in: O. Ashenfelter & D. Card (ed.), Handbook of Labor Economics, edition 1, volume 4, chapter 3, pages 229-330, Elsevier.
    2. Dohmen, Thomas, 2014. "Behavioral labor economics: Advances and future directions," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 30(C), pages 71-85.
    3. Timothy J. Richards, 2020. "Income Targeting and Farm Labor Supply," American Journal of Agricultural Economics, John Wiley & Sons, vol. 102(2), pages 419-438, March.
    4. Alex Markle & George Wu & Rebecca White & Aaron Sackett, 2018. "Goals as reference points in marathon running: A novel test of reference dependence," Journal of Risk and Uncertainty, Springer, vol. 56(1), pages 19-50, February.
    5. Martin, Vincent, 2017. "When to quit: Narrow bracketing and reference dependence in taxi drivers," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 144(C), pages 166-187.
    6. Eil, David & Lien, Jaimie W., 2014. "Staying ahead and getting even: Risk attitudes of experienced poker players," Games and Economic Behavior, Elsevier, vol. 87(C), pages 50-69.
    7. Jonathan de Quidt, 2018. "Your Loss Is My Gain: A Recruitment Experiment with Framed Incentives," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 16(2), pages 522-559.
    8. de Quidt, Jonathan, 2014. "Your loss is my gain: a recruitment experiment with framed incentives," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 58208, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    9. Heiko Karle & Dirk Engelmann & Martin Peitz, 2022. "Student performance and loss aversion," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 124(2), pages 420-456, April.
    10. Björn Bartling & Leif Brandes & Daniel Schunk, 2015. "Expectations as Reference Points: Field Evidence from Professional Soccer," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 61(11), pages 2646-2661, November.
    11. Eric J. Allen & Patricia M. Dechow & Devin G. Pope & George Wu, 2017. "Reference-Dependent Preferences: Evidence from Marathon Runners," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 63(6), pages 1657-1672, June.
    12. Hsiaw, Alice, 2013. "Goal-setting and self-control," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 148(2), pages 601-626.
    13. Cadsby, C. Bram & Song, Fei & Zubanov, Nick, 2024. "Working more for more and working more for less: Labor supply in the gain and loss domains," Labour Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(C).
    14. Dertwinkel-Kalt, Markus & Köster, Mats, 2017. "Salient compromises in the newsvendor game," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 141(C), pages 301-315.
    15. Vincent P. Crawford & Juanjuan Meng, 2011. "New York City Cab Drivers' Labor Supply Revisited: Reference-Dependent Preferences with Rational-Expectations Targets for Hours and Income," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 101(5), pages 1912-1932, August.
    16. Zubrickas, Robertas, 2023. "The relative income effect and labor supply," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 209(C), pages 176-184.
    17. Koch, Alexander K. & Nafziger, Julia, 2011. "Goals and Psychological Accounting," IZA Discussion Papers 5802, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    18. Håkan Eggert & Viktoria Kahui, 2013. "Reference-dependent behaviour of paua (abalone) divers in New Zealand," Applied Economics, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 45(12), pages 1571-1582, April.
    19. Heiko Karle & Martin Peitz, 2014. "Competition under consumer loss aversion," RAND Journal of Economics, RAND Corporation, vol. 45(1), pages 1-31, March.
    20. Kohei Daido & Takeshi Murooka, 2016. "Team Incentives and Reference‐Dependent Preferences," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 25(4), pages 958-989, December.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:jeborg:v:99:y:2014:i:c:p:1-17. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/jebo .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.