A system of non-tradable credits that flow between individuals like karma, hence proposed under that name, is a mechanism for repeated resource allocation that comes with attractive efficiency and fairness properties, in theory. In this study, we test karma in an online experiment in which human subjects repeatedly compete for a resource with time-varying and stochastic individual preferences or urgency to acquire the resource. We confirm that karma has significant and sustained welfare benefits even in a population with no prior training. We identify mechanism usage in contexts with sporadic high urgency, more so than with frequent moderate urgency, and implemented as a simple (binary) karma bidding scheme as particularly effective for welfare improvements: relatively larger aggregate efficiency gains are realized that are (almost) Pareto superior. These findings provide guidance for further testing and for future implementation plans of such mechanisms in the real world.

翻译：一种不可交易的信用体系在个体间流动，类似于业力（karma），因此以其命名，是一种重复资源分配机制，理论上具有吸引人的效率与公平特性。本研究通过在线实验测试业力机制，实验中人类受试者反复竞争一种资源，且个体获取资源的偏好或紧迫性随时间变化并具有随机性。我们证实，即使在未经事先训练的群体中，业力机制仍能产生显著且持续的社会福利改善。我们发现，在偶发性高紧迫性情境中（相较于频繁的中等紧迫性情境），该机制的使用尤为有效，且以简单（二元）业力竞价方案实施时对福利提升特别有效：实现了相对更大的总体效率增益，这些增益（几乎）是帕累托更优的。这些发现为此类机制在现实世界中的进一步测试与未来实施计划提供了指导。