Research Paper 28: Self-serving redistributive preferences among natives and immigrants in the UK

In an online experiment, we investigate how bias and equity concerns influence the redistributive preferences of UK natives and immigrants.

Natives and immigrants were paired with each other in a series of distributive situations. They decided how a pie created from the previous contributions of both parties should be divided and indicated what they thought was their fair share from the perspective of British residents, who acted as unbiased bystanders. We obtained the audience split through a supplementary survey. We found that the allocation decisions of natives and immigrants showed no own-group bias. However, their decisions were selfishly biased as they indicated that the pie had been created solely from their own contributions. This behavior disappeared when it disproportionately harmed the partner. Their fairness beliefs showed evidence of egocentric norm adoption: they favored equality as contributors and equality as non-contributors.

They also believed that viewers would discriminate negatively against immigrants and in favor of natives, but this perception was unfounded in terms of audience divisions. The implications of our findings were put into context with migration research and integration policy.