Voluntary leadership and asymmetric endowments in the investment game (Q1630469)

Summary: We experimentally investigate variants of the investment game by \textit{J. Berg} et al. [Games Econ. Behav. 10, No. 1, 122--142 (1995; Zbl 0831.90008)], in which one of the two players decides who are first mover and second mover. It has been shown by the first author et al. [``Voluntary leadership in an experimental trust game'', J. Econ. Behav. Organ. 108, 442--452 (2014; \url{doi:10.1016/j.jebo.2014.02.008})] that voluntary leadership increases both investment and backtransfer. We interpret voluntary leadership as a signal of cooperation that stimulates reciprocal cooperation. If a relatively rich player takes the lead (putting himself/herself under investment risk) this should be seen as a less strong signal of cooperation than taking the lead among equally endowed players. Indeed, we show that under asymmetric endowments, voluntary leadership has a weaker effect than under symmetric endowments.