Abstract
The vast amount of research devoted to public goods games has shown that contributions may be dramatically affected by varying framing conditions. This is particularly relevant in the context of donations to charities and non-governmental organizations. Here, we design a multiple public goods experiment by introducing five types of funds, each differing in the fraction of the contribution that is donated to a charity. We found that people contribute more to public goods when the associated social donations are presented as indirect rather than as direct donations. At the same time, the fraction of the donations devoted to charity is not affected by the framing. We have also found that, on average, women contribute to public goods and donate to charity significantly more than men. These findings are of potential interest to the design of social investment tools, in particular for charities to ask for better institutional designs from policy makers.
Highlights
The number and economic relevance of charities and nongovernmental organizations has rapidly grown in the last few decades
More than 1 billion people give money to charities [11]. In view of this volume of activity, philanthropy and voluntary contributions to charities have aroused the interest of a growing number of researchers in the last decades [12,13], leading to theoretical models [14], qualitative research [15], and experimental studies on the economics of charity [16], fundraising events [17], different forms of fundraising [18], and the effect of status [19], lead donors [20], rebates [21], subsidies [22], and message framing [23] on charitable giving
In a standard public good games (PGGs), participants contribute to a common pot, and the total of the pot is multiplied by the so-called multiplication factor, being subsequently distributed among all participants irrespective of their contribution
Summary
The number and economic relevance of charities and nongovernmental organizations has rapidly grown in the last few decades. More than 1 billion people give money to charities [11] In view of this volume of activity, philanthropy and voluntary contributions to charities have aroused the interest of a growing number of researchers in the last decades [12,13], leading to theoretical models [14], qualitative research [15], and experimental studies on the economics of charity [16], fundraising events [17], different forms of fundraising [18], and the effect of status [19], lead donors [20], rebates [21], subsidies [22], and message framing [23] on charitable giving
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