The influence of wages on public officials' corruptibility : A laboratory investigation

Summary, in English

Previous studies have proposed a link between corruption and wages in the public sector. The present paper investigates this link using a laboratory experiment. In the experiment, public officials have the opportunity to accept a bribe and can then decide between a neutral and a corrupt action. The corrupt action benefits the briber but poses a large negative externality on a charity. The results show that increasing public officials' wages greatly reduces their corruptibility. In particular, low-wage public officials accept 91% of bribes on average, whereas high-wage public officials accept 38%. Moreover, high-wage public officials are less likely to choose the corrupt option. Additionally, the results suggest that a positive monitoring rate may be necessary for these effects to arise.

• Author: R. Van Veldhuizen
• Publishing year: 2013-12-01
• Language: English
• Pages: 341-356
• Publication/Series: Journal of Economic Psychology
• Volume: 39
• Links: http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.joep.2013.09.009
• Document type: Journal article
• Publisher: Elsevier
• Topic: Economics
• Keywords: Bribery; Corruption; Experimental economics; Laboratory experiment
• Status: Published
• ISBN/ISSN/Other: ISSN: 0167-4870