Recession experiences during early adulthood shape prosocial attitudes later in life

This paper explores whether the experience of a recession during early adulthood shapes individuals’ prosocial attitudes. The analysis uses survey responses to experimentally validated questions that measure prosocial attitudes for approximately 64,000 respondents in 74 countries. The identification approach exploits variation in recession experiences across 75 different birth cohorts. We find that exposure to a recession during early adulthood is associated with lower levels of prosociality later in life. The effect only emerges for experiences during the impressionable years (age 18–25), mainly affects prosocial attitudes among men, and is orthogonal to the effect of experiences with democracy. • We ask how recession experiences in early adulthood impact prosociality in later life. • We analyze survey data from 64,000 respondents across 74 countries. • Recession exposure during early adulthood is linked to reduced prosociality.