Abstract

Drawing on literature from corporate social responsibility and household philanthropy, the present thesis examines the philanthropic activity of business-owning households. Specifically, I study how owning a business and characteristics of that business influence both monetary giving and volunteering of time. I suggest that because business-owning households accrue reputational benefits that also spill over to their firms, they are more likely to be involved in philanthropy activity. However, this extent of philanthropy activities is likely to vary depending on characteristics of the business which the households own such as firm return on sales, firm size, family ownership, family involvement in active management. In order to test the arguments, I utilize the 2013 Survey of Consumer Finances which contains 6,111 households’ financial observations. Results indicate that business-owning households are more prone to donate money and their time, but the strength of this relationship is dependent on business characteristics. Contributions are expected to make covering the shortage in the current literature of the household philanthropy phenomena. Conclusions, implications, and also suggestions for the future direction are discussed.