No need for more time: Intertemporal allocation decisions under time pressure

- We experimentally analyze the stability of time preferences under time pressure.
- Preferences are stable across conditions for present-bias and utility function curvature.
- We find subjects to be significantly more patient under time pressure.
- Individual level analyses confirm aggregate results.
- Our results are robust when analyzing different sub-samples.

Time preferences drive decisions in many economic contexts. For understanding the underlying decision process, it is key to identify what affects these preferences in different situations. To shed light on how people make intertemporal allocation choices, we analyze the stability of time preferences under time pressure. Conducting a laboratory study with 144 subjects using convex time budgets, we elicit time preferences with and without time pressure in a within-subject design. We find preferences to be stable across conditions for aggregate estimates of present-bias and utility function curvature. For standard discounting, we find subjects to be significantly less impatient under time pressure. All results hold across specifications and different sub-samples. Individual-level analyses confirm aggregate findings.