Rational Philanthropy and Cultural Capital

This paper develops a theory of rational philanthropyin forming ``cultural capital'' and aestheticpreferences. The study maintains that changes incapital market opportunities provide investmentmotives for private and public giving. Theseimplications are examined in a Vector Autoregressive(VAR) model of funding in the arts and humanities inthe United States for the period 1966 to 1997. Theresults suggest private philanthropy increased inresponse to both lower real returns on capital marketassets and cuts in public funding. On the other hand,public funding for the endowments is not explained byany of the variables in the model, including its pasthistory. Copyright Kluwer Academic Publishers 2000