Complexity and the Crowd: Measuring Preferences for the Completion or Deferral of Complex Tasks

The experiment by Oprea (2020) shows that complexity aversion drives individuals to favor heuristics and simplicity at the expense of potential payment. Building on this, I replicate Oprea's experiment online to measure willingness-to-pay (WTP) for avoiding complex tasks, as well as a new experiment measuring WTP for either completing tasks individually or deferring to a group. Findings confirm the relationship between complexity and WTP but reveal higher aversion levels in an online context. This echoes Oprea's conclusions on the importance of simplification in policy design, although significant deviations in accuracy suggest that these specific implementation tasks may be ill-suited for measuring complexity. From Experiment Two, increasing complexity motivates individuals to outsource tasks, with most participants preferring to defer tasks rather than complete them, although those who prefer to complete show stronger preferences. Accuracy is greater among those who prefer to complete tasks, commensurate with model predictions. These results highlight the interplay of complexity and wisdom of the crowd, providing insights into the formulation and efficacy of specialization and comparative advantage.