Differentiated Public Goods

Abstract

I study a model where different citizens have different preferences over different public goods. The model resolves three 30-year-old empirical paradoxes regarding public good provision (that many people contribute to public goods, that they contribute a lot, and that government contributions do not crowd out private contributions dollar-by-dollar). It also explains why polarised (diverse) societies contribute less (more) to public goods when compared to a homogeneous society. I also study how activist entrepreneurs package differentiated public goods into bundles to maximize donations.