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The Effect of Income on Religiousness

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  • Thomas Buser

Abstract

How does income affect religiousness? Using self-collected survey data, we estimate the effects of income on religious behaviour. As a source of exogenous income variation we use a change in the eligibility criteria for a government cash transfer in Ecuador and apply a regression discontinuity strategy to estimate causal effects. We find significant effects of income on religiousness. Households that earn more go to church more often. Households that earn more are also more likely to be members of an evangelical community rather than of the mainstream catholic church.

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  • Thomas Buser, 2014. "The Effect of Income on Religiousness," CESifo Working Paper Series 4801, CESifo.
    • Handle: RePEc:ces:ceswps:_4801
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Dean Karlan & Matt Lowe & Robert Darko Osei & Isaac Osei-Akoto & Benjamin N. Roth & Christopher R. Udry, 2022. "Social Protection and Social Distancing During the Pandemic: Mobile Money Transfers in Ghana," NBER Working Papers 30309, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    2. Aslam, Maqsood & Weill, Laurent & Iqbal, Hira, 2022. "Do mountains move faith?," Economic Modelling, Elsevier, vol. 117(C).
    3. Silveus, Neil & Stoddard, Christiana, 2020. "Identifying the causal effect of income on religiosity using the Earned Income Tax Credit," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 178(C), pages 903-924.
    4. Mocan, Naci & Pogorelova, Luiza, 2017. "Compulsory schooling laws and formation of beliefs: Education, religion and superstition," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 142(C), pages 509-539.
    5. Sriya Iyer, 2016. "The New Economics of Religion," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 54(2), pages 395-441, June.
    6. Emmanuelle Auriol & Julie Lassébie & Amma Panin & Eva Raiber & Paul Seabright, 2020. "God Insures those Who Pay? Formal Insurance and Religious Offerings in Ghana," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 135(4), pages 1799-1848.
    7. David de la Croix & Fabio Mariani & Marion Mercier, 2023. "Driven By Institutions, Shaped By Culture: Human Capital And The Secularization Of Marriage In Italy," International Economic Review, Department of Economics, University of Pennsylvania and Osaka University Institute of Social and Economic Research Association, vol. 64(4), pages 1777-1818, November.
    8. Masuda, Kazuya & Yudhistira, Muhammad Halley, 2020. "Does education secularize the Islamic population? The effect of years of schooling on religiosity, voting, and pluralism in Indonesia," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 130(C).
    9. Francisco Costa & Angelo Marcantonio & Rudi Rocha, 2023. "Stop Suffering! Economic Downturns and Pentecostal Upsurge," Journal of the European Economic Association, European Economic Association, vol. 21(1), pages 215-250.
    10. Cesur, Resul & Freidman, Travis & Sabia, Joseph J., 2020. "War, traumatic health shocks, and religiosity," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 179(C), pages 475-502.
    11. Iyer, Sriya & Cavalcanti, Tiago & Rauh, Christopher & Roerig, Christian & ,, 2022. "A City of God: Afterlife Beliefs and Job Support in Brazil," CEPR Discussion Papers 17719, C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers.
    12. Raphael Corbi & Fabio Miessi Sanches, 2022. "Church Competition, Religious Subsidies and the Rise of Evangelicalism: a Dynamic Structural Analysis," Working Papers, Department of Economics 2022_09, University of São Paulo (FEA-USP).
    13. Hasan, Iftekhar & Noth, Felix & Tonzer, Lena, 2023. "Cultural norms and corporate fraud: Evidence from the Volkswagen scandal," Journal of Corporate Finance, Elsevier, vol. 82(C).
    14. Choy, James P., 2016. "Religion and the Family: The Case of the Amish," Economic Research Papers 269580, University of Warwick - Department of Economics.
    15. Yu-Chin Hsu & Chung-Ming Kuan & Giorgio Teng-Yu Lo, 2017. "Quantile Treatment Effects in Regression Discontinuity Designs with Covariates," IEAS Working Paper : academic research 17-A009, Institute of Economics, Academia Sinica, Taipei, Taiwan.
    16. Liang, Yinhe & Dong, Zhiyong, 2019. "Has education led to secularization? Based on the study of compulsory education law in China," China Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 54(C), pages 324-336.
    17. Paredes, Tatiana, 2017. "The long-term effects of cash transfers on education and labor market outcomes," MPRA Paper 88809, University Library of Munich, Germany, revised 03 Sep 2018.
    18. Casco José L., 2022. "Intra-household Resource Shares under Poverty Transfers: Evidence from Ecuador," Working Papers 2022-03, Banco de México.
    19. Shai, Ori, 2022. "Does armed conflict increase individuals’ religiosity as a means for coping with the adverse psychological effects of wars?," Social Science & Medicine, Elsevier, vol. 296(C).
    20. Paredes-Torres, Tatiana, 2017. "The impact of exposure to cash transfers on education and labor market outcomes," MPRA Paper 79008, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    21. Carolina Caetano & Gregorio Caetano & Juan Carlos Escanciano, 2023. "Regression discontinuity design with multivalued treatments," Journal of Applied Econometrics, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 38(6), pages 840-856, September.
    22. Mavisakalyan, Astghik & Tarverdi, Yashar & Weber, Clas, 2020. "Paradise Postponed: Future Tense and Religiosity," GLO Discussion Paper Series 500, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
    23. Hasan, Iftekhar & Noth, Felix & Tonzer, Lena, 2019. "Thou shalt not bear false witness against your customers: Cultural norms and the Volkswagen scandal," IWH Discussion Papers 21/2019, Halle Institute for Economic Research (IWH).
    24. Carolina Caetano & Gregorio Caetano & Juan Carlos Escanciano, 2020. "Regression Discontinuity Design with Multivalued Treatments," Papers 2007.00185, arXiv.org.
    25. Goeun Lee & Myoung-jae Lee, 2023. "Regression Discontinuity for Binary Response and Local Maximum Likelihood Estimator to Extrapolate Treatment," Evaluation Review, , vol. 47(2), pages 182-208, April.

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    More about this item

    Keywords

    religion; income effects; regression discontinuity;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • Z12 - Other Special Topics - - Cultural Economics - - - Religion

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