Managing “Last Moment Behavior”: Non-binding target dates to reduce the spikes in task completion at deadlines
Journal of Public Economics · 2023 · Thomas Dirkmaat、Kirsten I. M. Rohde、Evelien van de Veer、Bram van Dijk、Xiao Yu
中文摘要
许多大型政府项目——如普查、纳税申报、拨款申请和补贴申请——都必须应对临近截止日期时集中提交的大量申报。为研究如何缓解申报高峰期的负荷过重问题，我们在荷兰一项涵盖农业企业申报的全国性普查中开展了两项实地实验（2016年 n = 28,557；2017年 n = 19,733）。结果表明，设定较早的非约束性申报目标日期，是一种稳健、可复制且有效的助推方法，能够促使申报者提前申报。设置非约束性目标日期的干预使高峰期之前申报的概率平均提高了4–5个百分点。让申报者自行选择非约束性目标日期也有效，但效应较小，使非高峰期申报的比例提高了3个百分点。提醒申报者“早申报、早评估”，以及提供有助于申报的信息清单，均未改善申报时间。
Abstract
Many large governmental programs - such as census, tax returns, grant applications, subsidy applications - have to deal with large volumes of submissions that take place right before the deadline. To study how to alleviate the overload during the peak submission period, we conducted two field experiments in a national census that includes submissions from farming enterprises in the Netherlands (n = 28,557 in 2016; n = 19,733 in 2017). The results show that setting an earlier non-binding target date for submission is a robust, replicable and effective method of nudging towards earlier submission. The treatments with non-binding target dates increased the probability of submitting before the peak-period by 4–5 percentage points on average. Letting people choose their own non-binding target date was also effective, yet with a smaller effect size of 3 percentage point increase in off-peak submissions. Reminding people of “early submission, early evaluation”, and providing a checklist of information to help with the submission did not improve the timing of submissions.