Wealth and Welfare: Divergent Moral Reactions to Ethical Consumer Choices

Abstract

This article examines perceptions of low-income consumers receiving government assistance and the choices they make, showing that this group is viewed differently than those with more resources, even when making identical choices. A series of five experiments reveal that ethical purchases polarize moral judgments: whereas individuals receiving government assistance are perceived as less moral when choosing ethical (vs. conventional) products, income earners, particularly high-income individuals, are perceived as more moral for making the identical choice. Price is a central component of this effect because equating the cost of ethical and conventional goods provides those receiving government assistance some protection against harsh moral judgments when choosing ethically. Moreover, earning one’s income drives perceptions of deservingness, or the right to spend as one desires. Those who receive assistance via taxpayer dollars are under greater scrutiny (frequently resulting in harsher moral judgments) by others. In addition to influencing perceptions of individual consumers, the results demonstrate that such attributions extend to groups who make ethical choices on others’ behalf, and that these attributions have real monetary consequences for nonprofit organizations.

Moral judgements of fairness-related actions are flexibly updated to account for contextual information

“…Moral judgements are influenced by various types of contextual information when that information is presented before a moral judgement is made. For example, moral judgements of interpersonal actions have been shown to depend on the relational status between moral actors and victims (Haidt & Baron, 1996;Simpson, Laham, & Fiske, 2016), their social identities (Miron, Warner, & Branscombe, 2011;Sawaoka, Newheiser, & Dovidio, 2014), their economic class (Olson, McFerran, Morales, & Dahl, 2016), as well as the victim's history of moral or immoral actions (i.e. their moral deservingness; Feather, 1999).…”

Beauty, Effort, and Misrepresentation: How Beauty Work Affects Judgments of Moral Character and Consumer Preferences

“…In our research, we focus on the behaviors that women can reasonably perform on themselves to enhance their appearance, such as styling hair, applying cosmetics, applying self-tanner, or exercising to alter body shape. In doing so, we examine behaviors that are high in controllability and therefore closely linked to inferences of personal responsibility and moral judgments (Olson et al 2016;Weiner 2000).…”

Conservatism as a situated identity: Implications for consumer behavior

“…Conservative moralization of self-control leads some purchases to be taxed since they seem to require punishment and liberal belief in equity leads other purchases to be taxed since they seem to imply that one has more than enough. Indeed, in a recent set of experiments involving hypothetical and real giving, Olson, McFerran, Morales, and Dahl (2016) show that Americans find buying organic food and making greener car choices a marker of morality for people who spend money they earned, but a marker of immorality for people who spend money they received from government assistance programs. Americans also act on these perceptions.…”

“…Americans also act on these perceptions. Olson et al' (2016) participants donated over 50% more to a community charity that aimed to feed the hungry than to an otherwise identical community charity that aimed to feed the hungry with organic food.…”