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Insuring Consumption and Happiness through Religious Organizations

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Author Info
Dehejia, Rajeev (Columbia U and Harvard U)
DeLeire, Thomas (Michigan State U and Congressional Budget Office)
Luttmer, Erzo F. P. (Harvard U)

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Abstract

This paper examines whether involvement with religious organizations insures an individual’s stream of consumption and of happiness. Using data from the Consumer Expenditure Survey (CEX), we examine whether households who contribute to a religious organization are able to insure their consumption stream against income shocks and find strong insurance effects for whites. Using the National Survey of Families and Households (NSFH), we examine whether individuals who attend religious services are able to insure their stream of happiness against income shocks and find strong happiness insurance effects for blacks but smaller effects for whites. Overall, our results are consistent with the view that religion provides an alternative form of insurance for both whites and blacks though the mechanism by which religious organizations provide insurance to each of these groups appears to be different.

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Publisher Info
Paper provided by Harvard University, John F. Kennedy School of Government in its series Working Paper Series with number rwp05-047.

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Date of creation: Aug 2005
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Handle: RePEc:ecl:harjfk:rwp05-047

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References listed on IDEAS
Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.:
  1. Richard B. Freeman, 1986. "Who Escapes? The Relation of Churchgoing and Other Background Factors to the Socioeconomic Performance of Black Male Youths from Inner-City Tracts," NBER Chapters, in: The Black Youth Employment Crisis, pages 353-376 National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!]
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  3. David G. Blanchflower & Andrew J. Oswald, 2000. "Well-Being Over Time in Britain and the USA," NBER Working Papers 7487, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  4. Gruber, Jonathan, 2004. "Pay or pray? The impact of charitable subsidies on religious attendance," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 88(12), pages 2635-2655, December. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  5. Jonathan Gruber & Daniel M. Hungerman, 2005. "Faith-Based Charity and Crowd Out during the Great Depression," NBER Working Papers 11332, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  6. Jonathan Gruber, 2004. "Pay or Pray? The Impact of Charitable Subsidies on Religious Attendance," NBER Working Papers 10374, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  9. Luigi Guiso & Paola Sapienza & Luigi Zingales, 2004. "The Role of Social Capital in Financial Development," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(3), pages 526-556, June. [Downloadable!]
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  11. Anderson, Gary M, 1988. "Mr. Smith and the Preachers: The Economics of Religion in the Wealth of Nations," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 96(5), pages 1066-88, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  13. Paul Gertler & Jonathan Gruber, 1997. "Insuring Consumption Against Illness," NBER Working Papers 6035, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  14. Paul Gertler & Jonathan Gruber, 2002. "Insuring Consumption Against Illness," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 92(1), pages 51-70, March. [Downloadable!]
  15. Robert J. Barro & Rachel McCleary, 2003. "Religion and Economic Growth," NBER Working Papers 9682, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  17. Deaton, Angus, 1992. " Household Saving in LDCs: Credit Markets, Insurance and Welfare," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Blackwell Publishing, vol. 94(2), pages 253-73.
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  18. Andrew E. Clark & Orsolya Lelkes, 2005. "Deliver us from evil: religion as insurance," PSE Working Papers 2005-43, PSE (Ecole normale supérieure). [Downloadable!]
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  19. Robert MacCulloch & Silvia Pezzini, 2002. "The Role of Freedom, Growth and Religion in the Taste for Revolution," STICERD - Development Economics Papers 36, Suntory and Toyota International Centres for Economics and Related Disciplines, LSE. [Downloadable!]
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  20. Jonathan Gruber, 2005. "Religious Market Structure, Religious Participation, and Outcomes: Is Religion Good for You?," NBER Working Papers 11377, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  21. Azzi, Corry & Ehrenberg, Ronald G, 1975. "Household Allocation of Time and Church Attendance," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 83(1), pages 27-56, February. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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  27. Mace, Barbara J, 1991. "Full Insurance in the Presence of Aggregate Uncertainty," Journal of Political Economy, University of Chicago Press, vol. 99(5), pages 928-56, October. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
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Cited by:
(explanations, Please report citation or reference errors to , or , if you are the registered author of the cited work, log in to your RePEc Author Service profile, click on "citations" and make appropriate adjustments.)

  1. Lynne Pepall & Daniel Richards & John Straub & Michael DeBartolo, 2006. "Competition and Civic Engagement in the Religious Marketplace," Discussion Papers Series, Department of Economics, Tufts University 0603, Department of Economics, Tufts University. [Downloadable!]
  2. Lehrer, Evelyn L., 2008. "The Role of Religion in Economic and Demographic Behavior in the United States: A Review of the Recent Literature," IZA Discussion Papers 3541, Institute for the Study of Labor (IZA). [Downloadable!]
  3. Andrew Clark & Orsolya Lelkes, 2006. "Deliver us from Evil: Religion as insurance," Papers on Economics of Religion 06/03, Department of Economic Theory and Economic History of the University of Granada.. [Downloadable!]
    Other versions:
  4. Simon Fan, C., 2008. "Religious participation and children's education: A social capital approach," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 65(2), pages 303-317, February. [Downloadable!] (restricted)
  5. S. Brock Blomberg & Thomas DeLeire & Gregory D. Hess, 2006. "The (After) Life-Cycle Theory of Religious Contributions," CESifo Working Paper Series CESifo Working Paper No. , CESifo Group Munich. [Downloadable!]
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