are rich people more altruistic than poor people?

That's the question posed by this extraordinary study:

This paper considers the decision of Gentiles whether or not to rescue Jews during the Holocaust, a situation of altruistic behavior under life-or-death stakes. I examine the role to which economic factors may have influenced the decision to be a rescuer. Using cross-country data, and detailed individual-level data on rescuers and non-rescuers, I find that (1) Richer countries had many more rescuers than poorer ones, and (2) Within countries, richer people were more likely to be rescuers than poorer people. The individual-level effect of income on being a rescuer remains significant after controlling for ease of rescue variables, such as the number of rooms in one's home, suggesting that the correlation of income and rescue is not solely driven by richer people having more resources for rescue. Given that richer people might be thought to have more to lose by rescuing, the evidence is consistent with the view that altruism increases in income.

I don't have much time to post today so I'll leave you with that to ponder...Any SOTU comments later.

Comments

[Elemjay]

Rich people might be more powerful people as well? I.e. more able to play the "don't you know who I am, I'll get you sacked" card that might provide them a bit more protection?

[peter]

The paper is behind a paywall, so I cannot determine if the author also controlled for national culture. Italians, for example, of all political persuasions, were generally hostile to anti-semitic policies, and so relatively fewer people of Jewish descent were killed than elsewhere in Europe (and those Jewish Italians who were, were mostly killed or transported during the period of direct German rule of Italy).