Income Inequality、Redistribution And Fairness Preference: A Experimental Study

Income inequality has always been an important social issue in our country.Redistribution is one of the most common ways to ease this issue. The formulation of redistribution system is based on the will of people, so understanding what factors determine the need of redistribution is significant. This paper uses experimental research method to analyze the determinants of redistribution, in particular, the effect of social fairness preferences. 252 subjects of zhejiang university of technology are recruited to join in the experiment. These subjects choose the level of redistribution taxation to be applied to an initial distribution of endowments among participants.This paper analyze subjects’ choices in three aspects, that is when subjects do as“disinterested observer”, “involved observer” under uncertainty and “involved observer” under perfect information. The paper finds that:(1)self-interest stands out as the dominant motive in the involved conditions. Insurance motive, and social preferences also work.(2) Subjects support less redistribution when the initial income is determined according to task performance. Whether pre-tax incomes are “arbitrary”or “earned” make sense.(3) Support for redistribution is sensitive to the cost of taxation and efficiency lost associated with it. The cost and efficiency lost is larger,subjects prefer less redistribution.(4)Female prefer more redistribution than male.(5)When the subject is from rural or he is not only one child in his family or his family income is not high, he is more support redistribution.