Delay and deservingness after winning the lottery

Arbeitspapier

Economics rests upon a set of presumptions about how human beings are affected by income. Yet causal evidence is scant. This paper reports a longitudinal study of randomly selected lottery winners. Remarkably, we show that it takes almost three years before they enjoy their money. We develop a model of dissonance and deservingness. We argue that, despite the tradition of economics, human beings may weight differently the different kinds of income that accrue to them. If so, it is not sufficient to describe utility by a function u(y), and it is not true that 'a dollar is a dollar'.

Object Details

• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Series: Working Paper ; No. 0815

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Wirtschaft ; General Welfare; Well-Being
• Subject: well-being ; lottery income ; deservingness ; cognitive dissonance ; happiness ; Glücksspiel ; Emotion ; Zufriedenheit ; Haushaltseinkommen ; Test

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Oswald, Andrew J. ; Winkelmann, Rainer
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (who): University of Zurich, Socioeconomic Institute
• (where): Zurich
• (when): 2008

Further information

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/76207
• Last update: 10.03.2025, 11:46 AM CET