"For given religious beliefs, increases in church attendance tend to reduce economic
growth. In contrast, for given church attendance, increases in some religious
beliefs -- notably heaven, hell, and an afterlife -- tend to increase economic
growth."
Some researchers argue that explanations for economic growth should be broadened
to include cultural determinants. Culture may influence economic outcomes by
affecting such personal traits as honesty, thrift, willingness to work hard, and
openness to strangers. Although religion is an important dimension of culture,
economists to date have paid little attention to its role in economic growth.
But in Religion and Economic Growth (NBER Working Paper No. 9682),
authors Robert Barro and Rachel McCleary analyze the influences of
religious participation and beliefs on a country’s rate of economic
progress. The authors use six international surveys conducted between 1981 and
1999 to measure religiosity -- church attendance and religious beliefs -- for 59
countries. There is more information available about rich countries than poor
ones and about countries that are primarily Christian. Barro and McCleary
consider first how religiosity responds to economic development, government
influences on religion, and the composition of religious adherence. They find
that their measures of religiosity are positively related to education,
negatively related to urbanization, and positively related to the presence of
children. Overall, religiosity tends to decline with economic development.
The presence of a state religion is positively related to religiosity, probably
because of the subsidies that flow to established religions in those countries.
However, religiosity declines with greater government regulation of religion and
with the religious oppression associated with Communism. Greater diversity of
religions -- that is, religious pluralism -- is associated with higher church
attendance and stronger religious beliefs. Countries in the sample that had low
levels of pluralism include some that are predominantly Catholic (Spain, Italy,
Portugal, Belgium, Ireland, and much of Latin America), as well as Protestant
Scandinavia, Orthodox Greece, and Muslim Pakistan and Turkey. Countries studied
that exhibit high levels of pluralism include the United States, Germany, the
Netherlands, Switzerland, Australia, Malaysia, Singapore, and South Africa.
The authors turn next to the assessment of how differences in religiosity affect
economic growth. For given religious beliefs, increases in church attendance
tend to reduce economic growth. In contrast, for given church attendance,
increases in some religious beliefs -- notably heaven, hell, and an afterlife --
tend to increase economic growth. In other words, economic growth depends mainly
on the extent of believing relative to belonging. The authors also find some
indication that the fear of hell is more potent for economic growth than the
prospect of heaven. Their statistical analysis allows them to argue that these
estimates reflect causal influences from religion to economic growth and not the
reverse.
Barro and McCleary suggest that higher rates of religious beliefs stimulate
growth because they help to sustain aspects of individual behavior that enhance
productivity. They believe that higher church attendance depresses growth
because it signifies a greater use of resources by the religion sector. However,
that suppression of growth is tempered by the extent to which church attendance
leads to greater religious beliefs, which in turn encourages economic growth.
