An emprical study to investigate the size of non-governmental organizations in OECD countries

Abstract

This study aimed to analyze the factors affecting the size of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) from a multinational perspective. Empirical analyses were conducted through econometric modeling, and the data of the 17 countries from 2003 to 2019 were used. The data was obtained from the World Bank and OECD database. We used advanced panel data estimation techniques (CUP-FM and CUP-BC) to obtain long-run coefficients. GDP per capita, general government final consumption expenditure, adult education at tertiary level, and Gini index growth declined grants by private agencies and NGOs’ contribution to GDP (GinGDP) initially but after a threshold level, GinGDP increased with growth at later stages of these variables. Urban population growth, employment, and foreign population have reducing effect on the size of NGOs. The size of NGOs has bidirectional causality relationship between GDP per capita, adult population at tertiary education level, employment to population ratio, and Gini index; and unidirectional causality between urban population growth, general government final consumption expenditure, and foreign population.

Keywords

• the size of non-governmental organizations
• third sector
• population heterogeneity
• econometric modeling
• economic and social factors