Ex-post blindness as excuse? The effect of information disclosure on giving

• Dictators face ex-ante uncertainty about recipient’s endowment.
• Main manipulation: the ex-post disclosure of recipient’s type.
• No difference in transfers with and without ex-post revelation of recipient’s type.
• Significant minority of dictators choose to remain ex-post ignorant.
• Dictators who choose to reveal share significantly more.

People passing by beggars without leaving a penny are not necessarily pure money-maximizers. In the world of sincere and dishonest recipients, some donors might anticipate the disutility they will suffer at the moment they realize their help is misdirected and reduce their willingness to donate to avoid these psychological costs. I employ a dictator game with ex-ante uncertainty about recipient’s endowment and requests from recipients to study how donors react to ex-post revelation of recipient’s type. I observe no difference in donations with and without ex-post information about recipient’s endowment. However, if donors could choose if they want to receive such information themselves, nearly a third of dictators choose to remain ignorant. Those dictators who choose to ex-post reveal the endowment of the recipient give significantly more.