Social Comparison: Reference Groups and Wage Transparency

Short Description: This module addresses two research questions on social comparison: First, whom do individuals compare themselves to; second, how accurate are individuals’ beliefs about their reference group’s income? Furtheremore the relative importance of different reference groups and individuals’ knowledge about their peers were elicted.

Methodological Details: Respondents were asked questions that focused on comparing their own gross job earnings with other groups and individuals.

Contact	Syear	Respondents	Dataset	Variables	Availability	Field	Method	Replication
Thomas Dohmen (University of Bonn), Stefan Liebig (DIW Berlin), Dana Muller (IAB)	2022	tba	inno	i105_26, i105_13, i105_38, i105_35, i105_23, i105_41, i105_44, i105_10, i105_46, i105_30, i105_36, i105_14, im_105, i105_34, i105_27, i105_4, i105_40, i105_17, i105_49, i105_15, i105_48, i105_8, i105_28, i105_11, i105_25, i105_1, i105_9, i105_47, i105_24, i105_22, i105_16, i105_45, i105_21, i105_12, i105_19, i105_31, i105_33, i105_29, i105_6, i105_7, i105_43, i105_5, i105_42, i105_2, i105_39, i105_32, i105_18, i105_3, i105_37, i105_20	~4/2025	Economics	Survey items