Are Donations Bigger in Texas? Analyzing the Impact of a Policy to Match Donations to Texas’ Emerging Research Universities

We examine the impact of the Texas Research Incentive Program (TRIP), a state policy that offers matching funds to incentivize private-sector donations to certain public universities. We use a national dataset and employ a generalized difference-in-differences approach with matching procedures to estimate the treatment effect of TRIP on revenues at eligible institutions. Results show that TRIP is associated with increases in revenue from private gifts and state grants/contracts, which suggests that policymakers can leverage public investment to incentivize private donations. We do not detect a statistically significant relationship between TRIP and endowments, so donations are likely used for short-term funding and do not create long-term dividends. We consider potential social consequences of selecting certain universities to benefit from incentive policies.