Summary

“This paper investigates the impact of economic policy uncertainty (EPU) on the corporate philanthropy (CP) behaviors of firms using a dataset from Chinese A-share listed firms. We find that, on average, firms decrease their CP significantly when economic policy uncertainty increases, but the response is heterogeneous for firms with different ownership types. Compared with their counterparts, private firms are willing to contribute more donations in an environment with high economic policy uncertainty. Further analysis shows that private firms take on more other types of corporate social responsibility at the same time, and private firms’ additional CP in a high EPU environment is rewarded with more subsidies, indicating that altruistic and political motives may play important roles in driving the CP behaviors of private firms.”