who really cares

The title above is the title of a book I'm currently reading. Occasionally I will hear or read statements charging that Christians are selfish or Republicans are greedy or that Americans don't share with those who are less fortunate. Those statements make me wonder, "Where did this person get their information?" It turns out that the people making those statements don't know what they're talking about. They are just parroting something that they have heard or they are just speaking out of their own prejudice, hatred or bias. It might be surprising to find out who is charitable and who isn't charitable.

The author of "Who Really Cares" explains why people give and why people don't. His explanations are based entirely on data. They are the fruit of years of analysis on charity and lots of work by scholars who have looked at the giving puzzle. The author sought to discover the facts about charity--whether they happen to conform to preconceived notions or not--as revealed by the evidence.

The author said that the results he found were not the conclusions he ever thought he would reach when he started looking at charitable giving ten years ago. The author said, "I have to admit that I probably would have hated what I have to say in this book." His bias was that the rich want tax cuts because they are uncharitable; Europeans care more than Americans about the world's poor; socialism is more compassionate than capitalism and so on. He thought that political liberals--who, he believed, genuinely cared more about others than conservatives did--would turn out to be the most privately charitable people. He had to admit that his views about "charity" amounted to little more than unquestioned liberal pollitical beliefs.

So, who cares the least? If caring means that you actually do something and not just talk...young liberals--perhaps the most vocally dissatisfied political constituency in America today--are one of the least generous demographic groups out there. Caring even less would be secular conservatives who tend to be single men of low income and little education, a small portion of the population. Secular liberals are well educated, and have the highest average incomes but give away less than a third as much money as religious conservatives and about half as much as the population in general.

Residents of Massachusettes give away only 1.8 percent of their incomes to all types of charity each year, which is the lowest in the nation.

In the year 2000 religious people--who, per family, earned exactly the same amount as secular people, $49,000--gave an average of $2,210 vs. $642 given by nonreligious people. They also volunteered more than twice as often.

People who pray every day are more likely to give money to charity than people who never pray (83% compared to 53%)

Religious people are more charitable in every measureable way--including secular donations, informal giving, and even acts of kindness and honesty. Religious people give more money than secularists to charities like the United Way, are more likely to volunteer for the PTA, give gifts of money to family and friends, more likely to give blood, to give food or money to a homeless person, to return change mistakenly given them by a cashier and to express empathy for less fortunate people.

Four demographic groups:
religious conservatives are the most charitable group (50 million people)
religious liberals come next in charity (18 million people)
secular liberals come next in charity (30 million people)
secular conservatives are the least charitable (20 million people)
As you can see, religion is the key ingredient.

I found this amazing. Who is most likely to say that they can't afford to give? People with a higher income.

This also was fascinating. Families in San Francisco give almost exactly the same amount to charity each year as families in South Dakota: about $1300. The average family in San Francisco County makes $80,822. The average family in South Dakota makes $45,364. So this means the average South Dakotan family gives away 75% more of its household income each year than the average family in San Francisco. When asked why people in South Dakota donate so much of their incomes to charity an executive at the South Dakota Community Foundation immediately responded: religion.

It turns out that the Church has made a huge difference in creating a culture of people who care. Are there unmet needs? Of course. But without the Church and its influence and teaching I'd hate to see where this world would be. When entertainers, politicians and others others make outlandish statements about how they would like to ban religion I wish that they could get a rush of truth to their head. Just reading this book would be a good start.