Charitable Giving In 2010

The annual report on giving is out today and the news is mixed. The good news from Giving USA Foundation is that giving is on the upswing growing 3.8% from 2009 to 2010. The bad news is that it hasn’t increased enough to offset the dip in giving in 2008 & 2009. In other words, the nearly $291 billion donated last year, was still more than 6% below the 2007 record.


How’d the nonprofit sector do in 2010?

• Total giving to charitable organizations was $290.89 billion in 2010 (about 2% of GDP).


• Giving increased by 3.8% from 2009 when giving was $280.3 billion.


• Revised Giving USA data shows that total giving has grown in current dollars in every year since 1954 except for 1987, 2008 and 2009.

Who gives?

• Most of the money flowing into the sector continues to come from individuals. Specifically, individuals gave $211.77 billion or 73% of total giving. Giving by individuals grew by 2.7%.


• 14% of donations came from foundations for a total of $41 billion (down 0.2%).


• Bequests accounted for 8% of donations or a total of $22.83 billion (up 18.8%).


• Giving by corporations ($15.29%) amounted to just 5% of all giving in 2010. But that represented an increase of 10.6% over 2009 due to increased cash and in-kind support by pharmaceutical companies.

Where does all that money go?

• 35% of all donations, or $100.63 billion, went to religious organizations (up only 0.8%). In the 56 years this report has been published, religious groups have always received the greatest portion of total giving. Most of this giving is to the donor’s house of worship.


• At 14% of giving in 2010, the next largest sector was education. In total, education charities received $41.67 billion (up 5.2%).


• 9% of donations went to human services charities. That amounted to a total of $26.49 billion in 2010 with no substantial change from 2009.


• 8% went to health charities for a total of $22.83 billion (1.3% increase over 2009).


• 8% went to public benefit charities for a total of $24.24 billion (6.2% increase over 2009).


• 5% went to arts, culture, humanities charities which received a total of $13.28 billion (up 5.7%).


• 5% went to international charities for a total of $15.77. International charities saw the biggest growth in giving (15.3%), in part, because of the earthquake in Haiti (January 2010).


• 2% of donations went to environmental and animal charities (no substantial change from 2009).

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