donations to universities to help one's child get accepted

Jonathan Meer (Stanford) and Harvey S. Rosen (Princeton) study alumni donations to a university, and show that alumni are more likely to give money as their children approach college age. Their abstract:

We study alumni contributions to an anonymous research university. If alumni believe donations will increase the likelihood of their child’s admission, and if this belief helps motivate their giving, then the pattern of giving should vary systematically with the ages of their children, whether the children ultimately apply to the university, and the admissions outcome. We call this pattern the child cycle of alumni giving. The evidence is consistent with the child-cycle pattern. Thus, while altruism drives some giving, the hope for a reciprocal benefit also plays a role. We compute rough estimates of the proportion of giving due to selfish motives.

So, their story only requires that alumni believe that contributions increase the probability of their children being accepted. Now, I would like to see someone determine whether this belief has support in the data.

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