When organizations talk about the “moral responsibility and economic necessity” of corporate citizenship, do they mean it? Have they researched and proven these claims? Giving back may be a moral responsibility; that’s subjective. It’s true if it has popular support. But many of us beneath the C-suite have accepted the “economic necessity” claim as an objective reality without the proof it requires.

What if this claim simply isn’t true? Or what if the point of diminishing returns in giving back is doing just enough to promote corporate citizenship for PR purposes? No doubt, many corporations get a lot of mileage out of a meager investment.

For skeptics who need more than mushy prose about giving back, and for managers involved in the economics of corporate citizenship initiatives, we offer five reasons to invest:

1. Corporate Risk Management: To steer clear of risks to their reputation, corporations need to understand stakeholder concerns. Industries including autos, energy, clothing, and food are susceptible to political and social pressures that can be mitigated by preemptively investing in the causes their would-be opponents support. Clothing companies that invest in fair labor practices and energy companies that invest in reducing carbon emissions, for instance, gain valuable goodwill from strategic initiatives.

2. Talent Recruitment: Both Generations Y and Z have been raised in the digital age, and have more exposure to social concerns, through digital and social media, than their forebears. So it should be no surprise that the most talented employees in these generations factor in prospective employers’ reputations. Of course, reputations can be shaped and improved by corporate responsibility. Companies in at-risk industries can use corporate responsibility to offset their risks in order to attract top young talent. Learn more about the generational differences in Are You Typical of Generation X, Y, or Z?

3. Investor Relations: Investors may have little interest in initiatives that don’t directly impact the bottom line, per se. Investing experiments with socially conscious ETFs (exchange traded funds that invest in companies that have socially conscious business models) have provided mixed results. But many institutional and individual investors are reluctant to invest in companies that don’t mitigate risks by enhancing their public perceptions. In particular, investors in risky industries don’t want to lose their shirts through PR disasters that can be preemptively lessened by corporate responsibility initiatives.

4. Brand Management: In the age of social media, employees, customers, shareholders, and other stakeholders all communicate their involvement in corporate citizenship efforts. The result is a public perception and brand equity that is built by doing good. Increasingly, Wall Street has been valuing intangible assets—brand and reputation being two of the most important—in market capitalizations.

5. License to Operate: Governmental regulations on industry (and prosecutions of companies in violation of regulations) have complex ways of factoring in corporate responsibility. In some cases, regulations like Cap and Trade directly provide a system of checks and balances (negative and positive contributions) that affect a corporation’s legal and social licenses to operate.

Employees invest in their companies not just through employee investment programs and 401(K)s, but also through their work and time. If you manage a team, feel free to share this blog post with your team. It can help to enhance employee loyalty by explaining the economic value of your company’s investments in corporate citizenship.

Learn more about this topic by reading What Is Corporate Citizenship and How Can Your Company Get Started?