Race and charitable church activity
By: Daniel M. Hungerman.
Contributors: National Bureau of Economic Research.
Series: NBER working paper series -- no. 13323.; Working paper series (National Bureau of Economic Research) -- working paper no. 13323.
Publisher: National Bureau of Economic Research
Published: 2007
Place of publication: Cambridge, Mass
Language: eng
Number of pages: 24
Subjects: Racism; Church charities -- Finance -- Econometric models
Description: The availability of public funding for charitable church activity has increased dramatically in the past decade. A key dispute over this increased availability is whether congregations' propensity to provide charitable services depends upon the racial composition of the community served. This paper uses three different congregation-level datasets to investigate how race affects charitable church activity. In all three datasets there is evidence that all-white congregations become less charitably active as the share of black residents in the local community grows. This response is found only when looking at charitable activities, not when looking at other types of church activity. Additionally, all-white congregations favorably disposed towards receiving government funding do not respond differently to black residents than do congregations which are not all-white.
Notes: "August 2007"

Includes bibliographical references (p. 22-23).

Also available in PDF from the NBER World Wide Web site (www.nber.org).