Replication Data for: Attitudes toward Economic Inequality: The Illusory Agreement

Recent studies of attitudes toward economic inequality suggest that most people around the world prefer very low levels of inequality, despite well-known trends toward greater inequality within many countries. Even within countries, people across the political spectrum are said to be in remarkable agreement about the ideal level of economic inequality. Using survey data from 40 countries and a novel survey experiment in the U.S., we show that this apparent agreement is illusory. When relying on a widely used cross-national survey measure of ideal pay ratios, preferred levels of inequality are heavily influenced by two well-documented sources of perceptual distortion: the anchoring effect and ratio bias. These effects are substantial and many times larger than the influence of fundamental political predispositions. As a result, these cross-national survey measures tapping preferences regarding economic inequality produce misleading conclusions about desired levels of inequality.当前有关经济不平等态度的研究表明，尽管全球多国国内均出现了不平等程度加剧的公认趋势，但全球大多数民众均倾向于极低的不平等水平。即便在同一国家内部，不同政治立场的群体也被认为在理想经济不平等水平上达成了高度共识。本研究依托覆盖40个国家的调研数据以及美国本土的一项新颖调研实验，证实上述共识实为假象。当使用学界广泛采用的跨国调研量表测量民众对理想薪酬比率的态度时，民众偏好的不平等水平极易受到两种已被充分证实的认知扭曲因素影响：锚定效应（anchoring effect）与比率偏差（ratio bias）。这两种效应的影响幅度极大，数倍于核心政治倾向对民众态度的作用。因此，这类用于衡量经济不平等偏好的跨国调研量表，会在民众期望的不平等水平这一问题上得出误导性结论。