The tremendous increase in the use of donor-advised funds for charitable donations has led policy-makers to ask if there is sufficient regulation and oversight of DAFs. In the absence of account level reporting, the debate has focused on the average payout rates of DAF sponsoring organizations,...

This paper examines how the tax simulation method can be extended to incorporate nonlinear budget constraints and nonstandard economic behavior. We simulate the effect of extending the charitable deduction to nonitemizers and study the effect of alternative "floors". The specific simulations...

Donations to charity are widely encouraged by policymakers through targeted tax incentives such as tax credits for contributions only to qualifying causes. We use a framed field experiment to test how the largest such program, Arizona's state income tax credit for donations to qualifying...

The economic argument for subsidizing charitable giving relies on the positive externalities of charitable activities, particularly from the religious institutions that are the largest recipients of giving. But the net external effects of subsidies to religious giving will also depend on a...

This paper analyzes the optimal treatment of tax expenditures. It develops an optimal tax model where individuals derive utility from spending on a contribution' good such as charitable giving. The contribution good has also a public good effect on all individuals in the economy. The government...

In an attempt to alleviate the shortfall in organs and bone marrow available for transplants, many U.S. states passed legislation providing leave to organ and bone marrow donors and/or tax benefits for live and deceased organ and bone marrow donations and to employers of donors. We exploit...

The philanthropic sector is highly consequential, particularly in the United States, and the most important policies directed toward this sector are tax policies. Yet most economic analysis of the optimal tax treatment of charitable giving is ad hoc, treating it as a subject unto itself. This...

The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act eliminated federal charitable giving incentives for roughly 20 percent of US income-tax payers. We study the impact of this on giving. Basic theory and our empirical results suggest heterogeneous effects for taxpayers with different amounts of itemizable expenses....

The recent proposal for tax reform developed by the Department of the Treasury suggests dramatic changes in the structure of the personal income tax. One likely side effect of the changes will be a significant adverse impact on the level of charitable contributions by individuals.This paper...