American Economic Review
ISSN 0002-8282 (Print) | ISSN 1944-7981 (Online)
Altruistic Capital
American Economic Review
vol. 107,
no. 5, May 2017
(pp. 70–75)
Abstract
To understand altruistic behavior, we must understand the process through which altruism develops and is shaped by the agents' own choices and exogenous factors. We introduce the concept of altruistic capital, which grows with effort devoted to altruistic acts and facilitates future altruism. We illustrate its potential use in the context of banking and conclude by showing that returns to altruistic effort shape the agent's choices and are shaped by external events such as the financial crisis.Citation
Ashraf, Nava, and Oriana Bandiera. 2017. "Altruistic Capital." American Economic Review, 107 (5): 70–75. DOI: 10.1257/aer.p20171097Additional Materials
JEL Classification
- D11 Consumer Economics: Theory
- D63 Equity, Justice, Inequality, and Other Normative Criteria and Measurement
- D64 Altruism; Philanthropy; Intergenerational Transfers