Can intertemporal choice experiments elicit time preferences for consumption?

The paper considers the problems of interpreting subjects’ responses to laboratory intertemporal choice and matching tasks that arise from (i) the existence of capital markets outside the laboratory; (ii) the distinction between observable income and unobservable consumption. It distinguishes between three approaches to these problems that are identifiable in the literature: the straightforward view; the separation view; and the censored data view. It shows that none of these is fully satisfactory and discusses the resulting implications for intertemporal decision-making experiments.