Does Charitable Gambling Crowd Out Charitable Donations? – Using Matching to Analyze a Natural Experiment
2012/04/10
研討會日期 : 2012-04-10
時間 : 14:30
主講人 : Professor Shih-Ying Wu
地點 : Conference Room B110
演講者簡介 : Shih-Ying Wu received his Ph.D. in Economics from University of Michigan, Ann Arbor in 2000. He is currently serving as Associate Professor of Economics at National Tsing Hua University. His research field is in public finance and applied microeconomics.
演講摘要 : Although lottery revenues have helped fund charities, charities are widely concerned about the potential crowding-out effect of people’s lottery spending on charitable donations. The impact of charitable lotteries on charitable donations depends on the motives of charitable donations, and is thus more an empirical questions. Previous empirical studies are however likely subject to sample selection bias owing to data availability and econometric frameworks. Utilizing propensity score matching method to overcome sample selections bias, this study estimates the effect of lotto outlays on direct charitable donations based on Taiwan’s experience of lottery introduction in 2002. We find that people’s lottery spending neither crowds out nor crowds in charitable donations after the control group for lottery players are matched by propensity scores. The evidence thus suggests that people are concerned more about how they make their donations, and supports the motive of conspicuous charitable giving by showing that people’s direct charitable donations are not replaced with their lottery spending. The findings from this study can thus relieve the concern about the possible negative impact of lottery on charitable donations.
