Abstract
Crowdfunding creates new opportunities of fundraising for fund seekers who are underserved in the traditional financial market. However, there could be potential issue of discrimination as funders can freely choose their choice of projects. We study whether the racial/ethnic discrimination exists in crowdfunding and how it may affect the projects fundraising outcomes. Using data from the largest prosocial lending crowdfunding platform, Kiva, we that there is no significant difference in the chance of getting funded for minority loans and White loans. However, we do identify that loans to African American have averagely smaller contribution per funder, implying certain degree of risk aversion from such loans, a sign of discrimination. To reach target goals, they may need a larger pool of funders. In addition, the percentage of US funders for African American loans is lower than other loans, suggesting even deeper discrimination from US funders.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Title of host publication | PACIS 2018 PROCEEDINGS |
| Subtitle of host publication | PACIS 2018 - Opportunities and Challenges for the Digitized Society: Are We Ready? |
| Publisher | Association for Information Systems |
| Pages | 3763-3770 |
| ISBN (Print) | 978-4-902590-83-8 |
| Publication status | Published - Jun 2018 |
| Event | 22nd Pacific Asia Conference on Information Systems (PACIS 2018): Opportunities and Challenges for the Digitized Society: Are We Ready? - Yokohama, Japan Duration: 26 Jun 2018 → 30 Jun 2018 https://pacis2018.jp/ |
Conference
| Conference | 22nd Pacific Asia Conference on Information Systems (PACIS 2018) |
|---|---|
| Country/Territory | Japan |
| City | Yokohama |
| Period | 26/06/18 → 30/06/18 |
| Internet address |
Bibliographical note
Research Unit(s) information for this publication is provided by the author(s) concerned.Research Keywords
- Racial/ethnic discrimination
- crowdfunding
- funding decision
