Work meaning is an important driver of labour supply. Since, per definition, work meaning is associated with benefits for others, it also has an important fairness dimension. In a theoretical model, we show that work meaning may increase or decrease workers’ reservation wages, depending on the relative strength of fairness concerns and meaning preferences.
- Speaker
- Date
- Monday 10 Feb 2025, 11:30 - 12:30
- Type
- Seminar
- Room
- 2-16
- Building
- Polak Building
(joint with Thimo De Schouwer, Elisabeth Gsottbauer, and Heiner Schumacher)
To examine the importance of these behavioural motives for labour supply, we conduct a survey experiment with representative samples from the Netherlands and Germany in which we vary within-subject the benefits that a job creates for others. We find that work meaning on average decreases reservation wages, but that only a minority of workers is actually willing to sacrifice wages for work meaning.
Fairness concerns are negatively related to willingness to pay for work meaning, while social preferences (like altruism) show a positive association. Workers with a high willingness to pay for work meaning tend to sort into sectors with high perceived societal contributions.
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