Survey: Percentage of Americans donating to charity at new low

At a time when more Americans are in need of assistance but fewer are in a financial position to be able to provide it, Gallup finds a new low in the percentage of Americans reporting they donated money to charity. Seventy-three percent of U.S. adults say they donated money to a charitable organization in the past year, surpassing the prior low from the Great Recession era. The percentage who say they have volunteered time to a charity is down from prior years, but not the lowest it has been…

In prior years’ polling, Gallup usually found more than 80% of U.S. adults saying they donated money to a religious or other type of charity in the past year — except for 2009, during the worst economy since the Great Depression, when it dipped to 79%. While the full economic toll of the coronavirus situation has yet to be realized, it may surpass that of the Great Recession if not the Great Depression.

Volunteer activity was its lowest in 2009, at 55%. While today’s 58% is slightly higher than that, it is down from 64% in the prior reading in 2017.