Score contribution per author:
α: calibrated so average coauthorship-adjusted count equals average raw count
Volunteer activity is work performed without monetary recompense. This article shows that volunteering is a sizeable economic activity in the United States, that volunteers have high skills and opportunity costs of time, that standard labor supply explanations of volunteering account for only a minor part of volunteer behavior, and that many volunteer only when requested to do so. This suggests that volunteering is a 'conscience good or activity'--something that people feel morally obligated to do when asked but which they would just as soon let someone else do. Copyright 1997 by University of Chicago Press.