Taking Aversion with Earned Endowments and Tangible Money

We determine if taking aversion is mitigated if participants physically handle currency. We design and conduct an experiment to determine if tangible money and earned endowments affect dictator choices to take from or give to charity. We report three results. First, tangible endowments reduce, but not eliminate, charitable giving. Second, there is more taking in the tangible treatments than in the intangible treatments. Finally, we do not observe a consistent earned money effect. With tangible endowments, earned money reduces giving. For intangible endowments, we find that earned money increases giving. This contrasts with prior studies that found that earning one’s endowment reduced giving in standard dictator games (i.e., those with anonymous other subjects as recipients). Our results suggest that the nature of the recipient and the action set are important factors for giving decisions in the laboratory