TY  - JOUR
AU  - Fong,Christina M.
AU  - Luttmer,Erzo F.P.
TI  - Do Race and Fairness Matter in Generosity? Evidence from a Nationally Representative Charity Experiment
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 15064
PY  - 2009
Y2  - June 2009
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w15064
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w15064.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Christina Fong
Department of Social & Decision Sciences
Carnegie Mellon University
500 Forbes Avenue, BP 208
Pittsburgh, PA 15213
E-Mail: fong2@andrew.cmu.edu

Erzo F.P. Luttmer
6106 Rockefeller Center, Room 305
Department of Economics
Dartmouth College
Hanover, NH 03755
Tel: 603/646-6479
E-Mail: Erzo.FP.Luttmer@Dartmouth.Edu
AB  - We present a dictator game experiment where the recipients are local charities that serve the poor. Donors consist of approximately 1000 participants from a nationally representative respondent panel that is maintained by a private survey research firm, Knowledge Networks. We randomly manipulate the perceived race and worthiness of the charity recipients by showing respondents an audiovisual presentation about the recipients. The experiment yields three main findings. First, we find significant racial bias in perceptions of worthiness: respondents rate recipients of their own racial group as more worthy. Second, respondents give significantly more when the recipients are described as more worthy. These findings may lead one to expect that respondents would also give more generously when shown pictures of recipients belonging to their own racial group. However, our third result shows that this is not the case; despite our successfully manipulating perceptions of race, giving does not respond significantly to recipient race. Thus, while our respondents do seem to rate ingroup members as more worthy, they appear to overcome this bias when it comes to giving.
ER  -