Working Paper: CEPR ID: DP18593
Authors: Livia Alfonsi; Michal Bauer; Julie Chytilov; Edward Miguel
Abstract: We study how human capital and economic conditions causally affect the choice of religious denomination. We utilize a longitudinal dataset monitoring the religious history of more than 5,000 Kenyans over twenty years, in tandem with a randomized experiment (deworming) that has exogenously boosted education and living standards. The main finding is that the program reduces the likelihood of membership in a Pentecostal denomination up to 20 years later when respondents are in their mid-thirties, while there is a comparable increase in membership in traditional Christian denominations. The effect is concentrated and statistically significant among a sub-group of participants who benefited most from the program in terms of increased education and income. The effects are unlikely due to increased secularization, because the program does not reduce measures of religiosity. The results help explain why the global growth of the Pentecostal movement, sometimes described a “New Reformation”, is centered in low-income communities.
Keywords: economics of religion; identity; human capital
JEL Codes: C93; O12; Z12
Edges that are evidenced by causal inference methods are in orange, and the rest are in light blue.
| Cause | Effect |
|---|---|
| Deworming program (I19) | Reduced likelihood of membership in Pentecostal churches (Z12) |
| Deworming program (I19) | Increased likelihood of affiliation with traditional Christian denominations (Z12) |
| Improvements in human capital (J24) | Reduced likelihood of membership in Pentecostal churches (Z12) |
| Improvements in human capital (J24) | Increased likelihood of affiliation with traditional Christian denominations (Z12) |
| Deworming program (I19) | Improvements in human capital (J24) |