An economic analysis of alternative means of family support for volunteer activities

An economic model was developed in this study for analyzing consumer support of volunteer activities. The analysis included the trade-offs between time and monetary contributions to volunteer causes. Data from the Time Use in Economic and Social Accounts Study were used to test the model of volunteer participation. The data used represented a national probability sample of United States households. Several variables were identified through the study's review of literature as influencing a consumer's choice of time or monetary contributions to voluntarism.

From the variables highlighted in the literature review, market wage rate, religious participation, education, occupation, gender, number of hours worked in the marketplace, consumption benefits, and number and ages of children were selected for study. Linear regressions were computed for the data using time spent in voluntarism and monetary contributions as the dependent variables. Various non-linear regression equations were also figured for the data. The best fit for the model of volunteer time allocations was found using market wage rate, religious practice, education, number of hours worked in the marketplace, and consumption benefits as common log predictors.

Using the above variables, 14 percent of the variation was accounted for with respect to volunteer time. Modeling monetary contributions was more difficult. Only three percent of the variation for monetary contributions was accounted for by running common log regressions with market wage rate, religious practice, education, number of hours worked in the marketplace and consumption benefits as predictors.