TY  - JOUR
AU  - Meer,Jonathan
AU  - Rosen,Harvey S.
TI  - Family Bonding with Universities
JF  - National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper Series
VL  - No. 15493
PY  - 2009
Y2  - November 2009
UR  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w15493
L1  - http://www.nber.org/papers/w15493.pdf
N1  - Author contact info:
Jonathan Meer
Department of Economics
TAMU 4228
College Station, TX 77843
Tel: 979/845-2059
Fax: 979/847-8757
E-Mail: jmeer@econmail.tamu.edu

Harvey S. Rosen
Department of Economics
Fisher Hall
Princeton University
Princeton, NJ 08544-1021
Tel: 609/258-4022
Fax: 609/258-6419
E-Mail: HSR@princeton.edu
AB  - One justification offered for legacy admissions policies at universities is that that they bind entire families to the university. Proponents maintain that these policies have a number of benefits, including increased donations from members of these families. We use a rich set of data from an anonymous selective research institution to investigate which types of family members have the most important effect upon donative behavior. We find that the effects of attendance by members of the younger generation (children, children-in-law, nieces and nephews) are greater than the effects of attendance by the older generations (parents, parents-in-law, aunts and uncles). Previous research has indicated that, in a variety of contexts, men and women differ in their altruistic behavior. However, we find that there are no statistically discernible differences between men and women in the way their donations depends on the alumni status of various types of relatives. Neither does the gender of the various types of relatives who attended the university seem to matter. Thus, for example, the impact of having a son attend the univer-sity is no different from the effect of a daughter.
ER  -