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The widow's offering: Inheritance, family structure, and the charitable gifts of women

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  • McGranahan, Leslie
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    Abstract

    Researchers and commentators have compared men and women's charitable giving patterns and have concluded that one sex was more generous than the other. Most research based on modern data has found women to be more philanthropic than men. In this article, I compare charitable donations of unmarried men and women in a sample of wills from 17th Century England. I find that men are more likely to make donations than women and make larger average donations. This difference in giving can be explained by differences in wealth and family structure and should not be ascribed to differences in charitable impulses.

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    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/B6WFJ-4W3PT7F-1/2/c3692a8d5de4423c27c290809fc6dbec
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    Bibliographic Info

    Article provided by Elsevier in its journal Explorations in Economic History.

    Volume (Year): 46 (2009)
    Issue (Month): 3 (July)
    Pages: 356-367

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    Handle: RePEc:eee:exehis:v:46:y:2009:i:3:p:356-367

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    Web page: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/inca/622830

    Related research

    Keywords: Charitable bequests Bequests Altruism Gender differences Charitable giving Blinder-Oaxaca decomposition;

    References

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    1. James Andreoni & Lise Vesterlund, 2001. "Which Is The Fair Sex? Gender Differences In Altruism," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, MIT Press, vol. 116(1), pages 293-312, February.
    2. Andreoni,J. & Brown,E. & Rischall,I., 1999. "Charitable giving by married couples : who decides and why does it matter?," Working papers 19, Wisconsin Madison - Social Systems.
    3. Gregory Clark & Gillian Hamilton, 2006. "Survival of the Richest: The Malthusian Mechanism in Pre-Industrial England," Working Papers 615, University of California, Davis, Department of Economics.
    4. Eckel, Catherine C & Grossman, Philip J, 1998. "Are Women Less Selfish Than Men? Evidence from Dictator Experiments," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 108(448), pages 726-35, May.
    5. Rooney, Patrick M. & Mesch, Debra J. & Chin, William & Steinberg, Kathryn S., 2005. "The effects of race, gender, and survey methodologies on giving in the US," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 86(2), pages 173-180, February.
    6. Leslie Moscow McGranahan, 2000. "Charity and the Bequest Motive: Evidence from Seventeenth-Century Wills," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 108(6), pages 1270-1291, December.
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