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Volunteer Labour Supply: the role of workers’ motivations

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  • Lorenzo Cappellari
  • Gilberto Turati

Abstract

In this paper we study the determinants of volunteering. We depart from previous literature that considers only economic incentives and investigate the role that extrinsic and intrinsic motivations play in shaping the supply of voluntary labour. We build on previous theoretical research and derive a framework for interpreting results from our econometric analysis. We consider a sample of Italian workers of which we can observe proxies of motivations and volunteering choices in three different sectors: social services, political activism and union activism. We make due allowance for the endogeneity of motivations and show that both types of motivations have an effect on volunteering. Consistently with theoretical models, we find extrinsic motivations to lower voluntary labour supply, whereas the opposite holds for intrinsic motivations.

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  • Lorenzo Cappellari & Gilberto Turati, 2004. "Volunteer Labour Supply: the role of workers’ motivations," Annals of Public and Cooperative Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 75(4), pages 619-643, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:bla:annpce:v:75:y:2004:i:4:p:619-643
    DOI: 10.1111/j.1467-8292.2004.00265.x
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    References listed on IDEAS

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    Cited by:

    1. Sandro Brusco & Luca Colombo & Umberto Galmarini, 2010. "Local Governments Tax Autonomy, Lobbying, and Welfare," Department of Economics Working Papers 10-01, Stony Brook University, Department of Economics.
    2. Bruno, Bruna & Fiorillo, Damiano, 2012. "Why without pay? Intrinsic motivation in the unpaid labour supply," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 41(5), pages 659-669.
    3. Damiano Fiorillo, 2009. "Offerta di attivita` gratuita in Italia: un’analisi micro-econometrica," Rivista Internazionale di Scienze Sociali, Vita e Pensiero, Pubblicazioni dell'Universita' Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, vol. 117(1), pages 23-59.
    4. Angelo Baglioni, 2006. "Entry into a network industry: consumers’ expectations and firms’ pricing policies," DISCE - Quaderni dell'Istituto di Economia e Finanza ief69, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Dipartimenti e Istituti di Scienze Economiche (DISCE).
    5. Maria Flavia Ambrosanio & Massimo Bordignon & Floriana Cerniglia, 2010. "Constitutional Reforms, Fiscal Decentralization and Regional Fiscal Flows in Italy," Chapters, in: Núria Bosch & Marta Espasa & Albert Solé Ollé (ed.), The Political Economy of Inter-Regional Fiscal Flows, chapter 4, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    6. Ana Gil-Lacruz & Carmen Marcuello, 2013. "Voluntary Work in Europe: Comparative Analysis Among Countries and Welfare Systems," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 114(2), pages 371-382, November.
    7. Luca Colombo & Herbert Dawid & Kordian Kabus, 2012. "When do thick venture capital markets foster innovation? An evolutionary analysis," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 22(1), pages 79-108, January.
    8. Stefano Colombo, 2008. "Discriminatory prices, endogenous locations and the Prisoner Dilemma problem," DISCE - Quaderni dell'Istituto di Economia e Finanza ief0079, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Dipartimenti e Istituti di Scienze Economiche (DISCE).
    9. Baglioni, Angelo & Monticini, Andrea, 2010. "The intraday interest rate under a liquidity crisis: The case of August 2007," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 107(2), pages 198-200, May.
    10. Torgler, Benno & García-Valiñas, Maria A., 2006. "Participation in Environmental Organizations: An Empirical Analysis," Berkeley Olin Program in Law & Economics, Working Paper Series qt6h51g5xv, Berkeley Olin Program in Law & Economics.
    11. Inmaculada García Mainar & Carmen Marcuello Servós & Isabel Saz Gil, 2010. "Trabajo voluntario en Organizaciones No Lucrativas: análisis de los factores determinantes de las diferencias entre hombres y mujeres," Hacienda Pública Española / Review of Public Economics, IEF, vol. 192(1), pages 9-31, March.
    12. Bruna, Bruno & Damiano, Fiorillo, 2009. "Why without Pay? The Intrinsic Motivation between Investment and Consumption in Unpaid Labour Supply," CELPE Discussion Papers 111, CELPE - CEnter for Labor and Political Economics, University of Salerno, Italy.
    13. Latha Poonamallee & Simy Joy, 2022. "Rousing Collective Compassion at Societal Level: Lessons from Newspaper Reports on Asian Tsunami in India," IIM Kozhikode Society & Management Review, , vol. 11(1), pages 25-46, January.
    14. Fiorillo, Damiano, 2007. "Offerta di Lavoro Volontario. Una Evidenza Micro-Econometrica Italiana," AICCON Working Papers 41-2007, Associazione Italiana per la Cultura della Cooperazione e del Non Profit.
    15. Giuseppe Mastromatteo, 2011. "H.P. Minsky And Policies To Countervail Crises," DISCE - Quaderni dell'Istituto di Economia e Finanza ief0102, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Dipartimenti e Istituti di Scienze Economiche (DISCE).
    16. Franz Hackl & Martin Halla & Gerald J. Pruckner, 2007. "Volunteering and Income – The Fallacy of the Good Samaritan?," Kyklos, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 60(1), pages 77-104, February.
    17. Charlene Kalenkoski, 2014. "Does generosity beget generosity? The relationships between transfer receipt and formal and informal volunteering," Review of Economics of the Household, Springer, vol. 12(3), pages 547-563, September.
    18. Anna Bassi & Kenneth C. Williams, 2014. "Examining Monotonicity and Saliency Using Level- k Reasoning in a Voting Game," Games, MDPI, vol. 5(1), pages 1-27, February.
    19. Giuseppe Mastromatteo, 2011. "The Debate on the Crisis: Recent Reappraisals of the Concept of Functional Finance," DISCE - Quaderni dell'Istituto di Economia e Finanza ief0105, Università Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Dipartimenti e Istituti di Scienze Economiche (DISCE).
    20. Fiorillo, Damiano, 2010. "Volunteers and conditions under which crowd-out effect could appear. An empirical evidence of psychological self-determination theory," MPRA Paper 22878, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    21. García-Valiñas, María A. & Macintyre, Alison & Torgler, Benno, 2012. "Volunteering, pro-environmental attitudes and norms," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 41(4), pages 455-467.
    22. Fiorillo, Damiano, 2007. "Do monetary rewards undermine intrinsic motivations of volunteers? Some empirical evidence for Italian volunteers," MPRA Paper 7783, University Library of Munich, Germany.

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