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Killer Incentives: Status Competition and Pilot Performance during World War II

Philipp Ager, Leonardo Bursztyn, Lukas Leucht, Hans-Joachim Voth

Review of Economic Studies 89(5), pp. 2257-2292 (2022)

Published version VoxEU NBER Digest Data

Abstract

Using newly collected data on death rates and aerial victories of more than 5,000 German fighter pilots during World War II, we examine the effects of public recognition on performance and risk-taking. When a particular pilot is honoured publicly, both the victory rate and the death rate of his former peers increase. Fellow pilots react more if they come from the same region of Germany, or if they worked closely with him. Our results suggest that personal rivalry can be a prime motivating force, and that non-financial rewards can lead to a crowd-in of both effort and risk-taking via social connections.

Keywords
status competition, incentives, risk-taking, fighter pilots, World War II
DOI
10.1093/restud/rdab085
Canonical
https://www.jvoth.com/papers/killer-incentives.html

Philipp Ager, Leonardo Bursztyn, Lukas Leucht, Hans-Joachim Voth (2022). “Killer Incentives: Status Competition and Pilot Performance during World War II.” Review of Economic Studies.