| Essay one. Equity and financing of pure public goods via lotteries . In this study, I consider a two-part tariff lottery game where provision of a pure public good is financed from the net proceeds of ticket sales. When participation in the game is obligatory (that is, the Government can charge all citizens a fixed participation fee, but citizens choose how many lottery tickets to acquire), then by choosing the fixed fee (or participation fee) appropriately, the first-best outcome can be implemented. At a subgame perfect Nash equilibrium, financing provision of the public good via a lottery mechanism solves the preference revelation problem. In equilibrium, when citizens purchase lottery tickets to maximize their expected utility, they pay their Lindahl price for the consumption of the public good. The public good is provided at the first-best level. When participation is completely voluntary, the lottery pot must be increased in order to attract the participation of those citizens who derive low marginal benefit from the provision of the public good. Although the first-best level of provision of the public good may not be reached, the two-part tariff lottery game provides at least as much of the public good as a simple raffle.; Essay two. Strategic interaction and charitable fund-raising . This study uses a game theoretical model to consider an economy where two public goods can be provided by different types of charities—either by one ‘United Charity’ or two specialized ‘stand-alone’ charities. An important feature of the analysis is the explicit consideration given to the strategic aspects of inter-charity competition. The study contrast the provision of the pure public goods in three dimensions, i.e., institutional frameworks, objective functions for charities, and the fund-raising structure. One significant result is that if charities are benevolent and donor-designation is honoured by the United Charity, the institutional structure and the timing of fund-raising campaigns do not matter; in contrast, both the institutional structure and the timing of fund-raising campaigns matter if charities maximize donation incomes.; Essay three. Canadian charitable giving: Cash versus playing charitable lotteries. Using a bivariate Tobit model, this empirical study analyzes Canadian giving behaviour by examining donations of cash versus indirect giving via the purchase of charitable-run lotteries, charitable bingos and casinos, as well as the buying of goods whose proceeds are used to finance charitable activities. The paper uses the survey of Giving, Volunteering and Participating (SGVP) conducted by Statistics Canada (and several other agencies) in 1997. In addition to looking at the relationship between direct and indirect charitable giving, this study also make predictions regarding how much will be donated either directly or indirectly with changes in tax rates, government expenditures, household income, as well as a variety of personal and household characteristics. |
