IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/oup/cesifo/v62y2016i3p522-546..html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Reciprocity in Organizations: Evidence from the UK

Author

Listed:
  • Florian Englmaier
  • Thomas Kolaska
  • Stephen Leider

Abstract

Recent laboratory evidence suggests that personality traits, in particular social preferences, may affect contractual outcomes under moral hazard. Using the British Workplace Employment Relations Survey 2004 we find that behaviour of employers and employees is consistent with the presence of gift-exchange motives: firms that screen applicants for personality are less likely to pay low wages and more likely to provide (non-pecuniary) benefits. Firms likewise benefit from employee screening, as they can implement more team-working and are generally more successful. Other human resource management practices only poorly predict these patterns. Moreover, there is no association between dismissals and personality tests, indicating that personality tests do not merely improve the fit between applicant and employer. Hence, we conclude that motivation based on gift-exchange motives is a plausible explanation for our results.

Suggested Citation

  • Florian Englmaier & Thomas Kolaska & Stephen Leider, 2016. "Reciprocity in Organizations: Evidence from the UK," CESifo Economic Studies, CESifo Group, vol. 62(3), pages 522-546.
    • Handle: RePEc:oup:cesifo:v:62:y:2016:i:3:p:522-546.
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://hdl.handle.net/10.1093/cesifo/ifw006
    Download Restriction: Access to full text is restricted to subscribers.
    ---><---

    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. Ernst Fehr & Simon Gächter, 2000. "Fairness and Retaliation: The Economics of Reciprocity," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 14(3), pages 159-181, Summer.
    2. Dewatripont,Mathias & Hansen,Lars Peter & Turnovsky,Stephen J. (ed.), 2003. "Advances in Economics and Econometrics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521818742, January.
    3. Dewatripont,Mathias & Hansen,Lars Peter & Turnovsky,Stephen J. (ed.), 2003. "Advances in Economics and Econometrics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521524117, January.
    4. Hagen Lesch, 2004. "Trade Union Density in International Comparison," CESifo Forum, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 5(04), pages 12-18, December.
    5. Dewatripont,Mathias & Hansen,Lars Peter & Turnovsky,Stephen J. (ed.), 2003. "Advances in Economics and Econometrics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521818735, January.
    6. Dewatripont,Mathias & Hansen,Lars Peter & Turnovsky,Stephen J. (ed.), 2003. "Advances in Economics and Econometrics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521524124, January.
    7. Fali Huang & Peter Cappelli, 2010. "Applicant Screening and Performance-Related Outcomes," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(2), pages 214-218, May.
    8. Dewatripont,Mathias & Hansen,Lars Peter & Turnovsky,Stephen J. (ed.), 2003. "Advances in Economics and Econometrics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521818728, January.
    9. Florian Englmaier & Katharina Schüßler, 2015. "Complementarities of HRM Practices - A Case for Employing Multiple Methods and Integrating Multiple Fields," CESifo Working Paper Series 5249, CESifo.
    10. Dewatripont,Mathias & Hansen,Lars Peter & Turnovsky,Stephen J. (ed.), 2003. "Advances in Economics and Econometrics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521524131, January.
    11. Ichniowski, Casey & Shaw, Kathryn & Prennushi, Giovanna, 1997. "The Effects of Human Resource Management Practices on Productivity: A Study of Steel Finishing Lines," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 87(3), pages 291-313, June.
    12. Florian Englmaier & Stephen G. Leider, 2010. "Gift Exchange in the Lab - It is not (only) how much you give ..," CESifo Working Paper Series 2944, CESifo.
    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. Sauermann, Jan, 2015. "Worker Reciprocity and the Returns to Training: Evidence from a Field Experiment," IZA Discussion Papers 9179, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    2. Ester Manna, 2017. "Customer‐oriented employees: Blessing or curse for firms?," Journal of Economics & Management Strategy, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 26(4), pages 842-875, December.
    3. Florian Englmaier & Stephen Leider, 2020. "Managerial Payoff and Gift-Exchange in the Field," Review of Industrial Organization, Springer;The Industrial Organization Society, vol. 56(2), pages 259-280, March.
    4. Non, Arjan, 2018. "Training participation and the role of reciprocal attitudes," ROA Research Memorandum 005, Maastricht University, Research Centre for Education and the Labour Market (ROA).
    5. Constança Esteves-Sorenson, 2018. "Gift Exchange in the Workplace: Addressing the Conflicting Evidence with a Careful Test," Management Science, INFORMS, vol. 64(9), pages 4365-4388, September.

    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. Simon Cornée & Marc Jegers & Ariane Szafarz, 2018. "A Theory of Social Finance," Working Papers halshs-01717167, HAL.
    2. Tolciu, Andreia, 2008. "Is unemployment a consequence of social interactions? Seeking for a common research framework for economists and other social scientists," HWWI Research Papers 1-15, Hamburg Institute of International Economics (HWWI).
    3. Abeler, Johannes & Altmann, Steffen & Kube, Sebastian & Wibral, Matthias, 2006. "Reciprocity and Payment Schemes: When Equality Is Unfair," Ratio Working Papers 109, The Ratio Institute.
    4. Jeffrey A. Flory & Andreas Leibbrandt & John A. List, 2010. "Do Competitive Work Places Deter Female Workers? A Large-Scale Natural Field Experiment on Gender Differences in Job-Entry Decisions," NBER Working Papers 16546, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. 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.
    6. Jeffrey A. Flory & Andreas Leibbrandt & John A. List, 2015. "Do Competitive Workplaces Deter Female Workers? A Large-Scale Natural Field Experiment on Job Entry Decisions," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 82(1), pages 122-155.
    7. Simon Cornée & Marc Jegers & Ariane Szafarz & Simon Cornée & Marc Jegers & Ariane Szafarz, 2022. "Feasible Institutions of Social Finance: A Taxonomy," Journal of Institutional and Theoretical Economics (JITE), Mohr Siebeck, Tübingen, vol. 178(3), pages 280-310.
    8. Gregory E. Kersten & Tomasz Wachowicz & Margaret Kersten, 2016. "Competition, Transparency, and Reciprocity: A Comparative Study of Auctions and Negotiations," Group Decision and Negotiation, Springer, vol. 25(4), pages 693-722, July.
    9. Chung-cheng Lin & C.C. Yang, 2006. "The Firm as a Community Explaining Asymmetric Behavior and Downward Rigidity of Wages," IEAS Working Paper : academic research 06-A014, Institute of Economics, Academia Sinica, Taipei, Taiwan.
    10. Lin, Chung-cheng & Yang, C.C., 2008. "The firm as a community explaining asymmetric behavior and downward rigidity of wages," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 68(2), pages 390-400, November.
    11. John Geanakoplos & Robert Axtell & J. Doyne Farmer & Peter Howitt & Benjamin Conlee & Jonathan Goldstein & Matthew Hendrey & Nathan M. Palmer & Chun-Yi Yang, 2012. "Getting at Systemic Risk via an Agent-Based Model of the Housing Market," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(3), pages 53-58, May.
    12. Christian Hellwig, 2004. "Heterogeneous Information and the Benefits of Public Information Disclosures (October 2005)," UCLA Economics Online Papers 283, UCLA Department of Economics.
    13. Gärtner, D.L. & Zhou, J., 2012. "Delays in Leniency Application : Is There Really a Race to the Enforcer’s Door?," Other publications TiSEM cbb8fac0-0cd7-4a0c-a6d4-a, Tilburg University, School of Economics and Management.
    14. Scott Duke Kominers & Alexander Teytelboym & Vincent P Crawford, 2017. "An invitation to market design," Oxford Review of Economic Policy, Oxford University Press and Oxford Review of Economic Policy Limited, vol. 33(4), pages 541-571.
    15. Itay Goldstein, 2005. "Strategic Complementarities and the Twin Crises," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 115(503), pages 368-390, April.
    16. Stephen Morris & Hyun Song Shin, 2004. "Liquidity Black Holes," Review of Finance, Springer, vol. 8(1), pages 1-18.
    17. Ennis, Huberto M. & Keister, Todd, 2005. "Government policy and the probability of coordination failures," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 49(4), pages 939-973, May.
    18. Zheng, Charles Z., 2019. "Necessary and sufficient conditions for peace: Implementability versus security," Journal of Economic Theory, Elsevier, vol. 180(C), pages 135-166.
    19. Christoph Breunig, 2019. "Goodness-of-Fit Tests based on Series Estimators in Nonparametric Instrumental Regression," Papers 1909.10133, arXiv.org.
    20. , & ,, 2013. "Selection-free predictions in global games with endogenous information and multiple equilibria," Theoretical Economics, Econometric Society, vol. 8(3), September.

    More about this item

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:oup:cesifo:v:62:y:2016:i:3:p:522-546.. 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: Oxford University Press (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/cesifde.html .

    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.