Observing others' actions can prevent bank runs, study finds.
The article explores how deposit insurance and observing others' actions affect bank runs. In a lab experiment with three depositors, different levels of insurance and observability influenced the likelihood of bank runs. When decisions were private, higher insurance reduced the chance of runs. But when decisions were visible, this wasn't the case. This suggests that observability can partly replace insurance, and the best insurance level should consider how much actions can be seen.