Moral Incentives in Credit Card Debt Repayment: Evidence from a Field Experiment

• 成果类型: Article
• 署名作者: Bursztyn, Leonardo; Fiorin, Stefano; Gottlieb, Daniel; Kanz, Martin
• 署名单位: University of Chicago; National Bureau of Economic Research; University of California System; University of California San Diego; Washington University (WUSTL); The World Bank; Center for Economic & Policy Research (CEPR)
• 刊物名称: JOURNAL OF POLITICAL ECONOMY
• ISSN/ISSBN: 0022-3808
• DOI: 10.1086/701605
• 发表日期: 2019
• 页码: 1641-1683
• 关键词: Religion; GOD; PUNISHMENT; ECONOMICS; default; SUASION

摘要

We study the role of morality in debt repayment, using an experiment with the credit card customers of a large Islamic bank in Indonesia. In our main treatment, clients receive a text message stating that non-repayment of debts by someone who is able to repay is an injustice. This moral appeal decreases delinquency by 4.4 percentage points from a baseline of 66 percent and reduces default among customers with the highest ex ante credit risk. Additional treatments help benchmark the effects against direct financial incentives and rule out competing explanations, such as reminder effects, priming religion, and provision of new information.