The #1 Most Charitable-Giving Nation

It’s us.

The United States now ranks the highest in terms of charity in a massive global survey that put the nation in fifth place in 2010, according to CAFAmerica, a member organization of the United Kingdom based Charities Aid Foundation International Network of Offices, providing charitable financial services to individuals, global corporations, charities, and foundations.

According to those surveyed, two out of three Americans said they donated money to charity (65 percent), more than two out of five volunteered their time (43 percent) and roughly three out of four helped a stranger (73 percent).  The new “World Giving Index (WGI) 2011” report is based on over 150,000 Gallup polling interviews with members of the public in 153 countries. The 2011 report looks at three aspects of giving behavior of individuals in the preceding month, asking if they have donated money to a charity, volunteered time to an organization, or helped a stranger. 

People like former President Jimmy Carter and singer Bono used to say that the US was "cheap", but John Stossel pointed out that that was not really true, (and Arthur Brooks noted that most charitable giving comes from the religious Right side of the political spectrum). We weren’t "cheap" then, and we’ve kept rising in this particular ranking since then.

I’m proud to be an American.

Filed under: Culture • Economics

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