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Religious Environments and the Distribution of Anti-Poverty Nonprofit Organizations

Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly

Published online on

Abstract

Previous scholarship highlights the effect that religious environments have on community-level outcomes such as neighborhood stability, economic development, and crime. In the present study, I extend work on the contextual effects of religion by examining how the religious composition of U.S. counties is related to the distribution of anti-poverty nonprofit organizations. Anti-poverty nonprofits represent an important source of support for communities across the United States, and history suggests that religious people and groups have played a significant role in their development. Still, it is unclear whether some religious environments may be more nurturing of these organizations than others. Utilizing spatial regression models and county-level data, I seek to address this question. I find that the geographic concentration of some religious traditions is related to a more robust presence of anti-poverty nonprofit organizations than others.