Report: US charitable giving dropped in 2022

Charitable giving in the United States declined in 2022 – only the fourth time in four decades that donations did not increase year over year – according to the Giving USA report released Tuesday.

Total giving fell 3.4 per cent in 2022 to US$499.3 billion in current dollars, a drop of 10.5 per cent when adjusted for inflation. The decline comes at a time when many non-profits, especially ones providing services to those in need, report an increase in requests for help.

However, Josh Birkholz, chairman of the Giving USA Foundation, which publishes the report and provides data and insights about donation trends, said the results are actually much better than they could have been considering the tough economic climate of late 2022.

“I go back and forth on whether it’s encouraging or discouraging,” Birkholz told The Associated Press in an interview. “There was a 20 to 25 per cent decline in the stock market and an 8 per cent inflation rate, but Americans still gave nearly a half trillion dollars.”

Those 2022 donations came after two record-setting years for charitable giving, driven by the unprecedented needs of the COVID-19 pandemic, said Una Osili, associate dean for research and international programmes at the Lilly Family School of Philanthropy at Indiana University and the Giving USA report’s lead researcher. It’s a sign of continued generosity, though there are some areas of concern.

“At the beginning of the 21st century, two thirds of Americans gave,” Osili said. “Today, that is down to under 50 per cent for the first time. So giving has grown, but fewer people are participating.”

The downturn in giving has led to issues at Community Help in Park Slope, better known as CHiPS, as it has in many charities across the country. The Brooklyn, New York, non-profit operates a soup kitchen and food pantry, as well as supporting single mothers and their infants.

“We saw inflation rise and, with that, we saw more working class individuals on our lines,” said Shanice Brown, CHiPS development director. “Donations declined – and donated food as well – because as the price of things increase, people need more and so they donate less.”

CHiPS’ issues are compounded by the number of asylum seekers that are currently housed near the charity in Brooklyn. While CHiPS was providing 275 warm meals a day at this time last year, these days it is offering more than 400 meals daily. And sometimes, they simply run out of food.

“When we run out of hot meals, we still provide sandwiches,” said Brown, who has been collaborating with other non-profits and food suppliers to try to make ends meet. “Anyone who comes to our door walks away with something.”

Even large-scale non-profits have had to come up with new solutions to battle inflation’s effects on their resources.

Jared Perry, chief revenue officer at Make-A-Wish Foundation of America, said that while donations to the foundation, which grants the wishes of children fighting critical illnesses, were up slightly in 2022, they are currently declining in some areas this year. And those drops come while Make-A-Wish copes with increased costs for travel, which is involved in about 75 per cent of the wishes they grant.

“I think we’ve seen a 37 per cent increase in rental car prices and that translates to a cost we have to bear,” said Perry, adding that Make-A-Wish has stepped up calls for supporters to donate their airline miles and hotel points in order to help stretch its funding. The foundation has also turned to partners in the travel industry for more help.

Jon Bergdoll, associate director of data partnerships at the Lilly Family School of Philanthropy at Indiana University and the lead analyst for the Giving USA report, said the long-running trend of “dollars up, donors down” in philanthropy offers potential growth for non-profits who can engage those currently not giving.

Decision makers for donations are “not mom and pop donors, they’re wealthy individuals,” Bergdoll said. “That is indicative of where the money is coming from now versus 30 or 40 years ago.”

AP