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During the COVID-19 pandemic, governments offered financial incentives to increase vaccine uptake. We evaluate the impact on COVID-19 vaccine uptake of cash equivalents versus being entered into lotteries. We randomly assign 1628 unvaccinated US participants into one of three 45-second informational videos promoting vaccination with messages about (a) health benefits of COVID-19 vaccines (control), (b) being entered into lotteries or (c) receiving cash equivalent vouchers. After seeing the control health information video, 16% of individuals wanted information on COVID-19 vaccination. This compared with 14% of those assigned to the lottery video (odds ratio of 0.82 relative to control: 95% credible interval, 0.58–1.17) and 22% of those assigned to the cash voucher video (odds ratio of 1.53 relative to control: 95% credible interval, 1.11–2.11). These results support greater use of cash vouchers to promote information seeking about COVID-19 vaccination and do not support the use of lottery incentives.

Original publication

DOI

10.1093/ooec/odad004

Type

Journal article

Journal

Oxford Open Economics

Publisher

Oxford University Press

Publication Date

16/06/2023

Volume

2

Pages

1 - 7

Keywords

experiments, COVID-19, cash, vaccine, FFR, online, incentives