Bowden
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"In 2011, the wealthiest Americans?those with earnings in the top 20 percent?contributed on average 1.3 percent of their income to charity. By comparison, Americans at the base of the income pyramid?those in the bottom 20 percent?donated 3.2 percent of their income."
"Piff later told New York magazine, the rich are way more likely to prioritize their own self-interests above the interests of other people. They are, he continued, more likely to exhibit characteristics that we would stereotypically associate with, say, assholes."
Why the Rich Don't Give to Charity - Ken Stern - The Atlantic
The wealthiest Americans donate 1.3 percent of their income; the poorest, 3.2 percent. What's up with that?
Ken Stern Mar 20 2013, 9:50 PM ET
When Mort Zuckerman, the New York City real-estate and media mogul, lavished $200 million on Columbia University in December to endow the Mortimer B. Zuckerman Mind Brain Behavior Institute, he did so with fanfare suitable to the occasion: the press conference was attended by two Nobel laureates, the president of the university, the mayor, and journalists from some of New York?s major media outlets. Many of the 12 other individual charitable gifts that topped $100 million in the U.S. last year were showered with similar attention: $150 million from Carl Icahn to the Mount Sinai School of Medicine, $125 million from Phil Knight to the Oregon Health & Science University, and $300 million from Paul Allen to the Allen Institute for Brain Science in Seattle, among them. If you scanned the press releases, or drove past the many university buildings, symphony halls, institutes, and stadiums named for their benefactors, or for that matter read the histories of grand giving by the Rockefellers, Carnegies, Stanfords, and Dukes, you would be forgiven for thinking that the story of charity in this country is a story of epic generosity on the part of the American rich.
It is not. One of the most surprising, and perhaps confounding, facts of charity in America is that the people who can least afford to give are the ones who donate the greatest percentage of their income. In 2011, the wealthiest Americans?those with earnings in the top 20 percent contributed on average 1.3 percent of their income to charity. By comparison, Americans at the base of the income pyramid?those in the bottom 20 percent donated 3.2 percent of their income. The relative generosity of lower-income Americans is accentuated by the fact that, unlike middle-class and wealthy donors, most of them cannot take advantage of the charitable tax deduction, because they do not itemize deductions on their income-tax returns.
But why? Lower-income Americans are presumably no more intrinsically generous (or prosocial, as the sociologists say) than anyone else. However, some experts have speculated that the wealthy may be less generous that the personal drive to accumulate wealth may be inconsistent with the idea of communal support. Last year, Paul Piff, a psychologist at UC Berkeley, published research that correlated wealth with an increase in unethical behavior: While having money doesn't necessarily make anybody anything, Piff later told New York magazine, the rich are way more likely to prioritize their own self-interests above the interests of other people. They are, he continued, more likely to exhibit characteristics that we would stereotypically associate with, say, assholes. Colorful statements aside, Piff's research on the giving habits of different social classes while not directly refuting the asshole theory suggests that other, more complex factors are at work. In a series of controlled experiments, lower-income people and people who identified themselves as being on a relatively low social rung were consistently more generous with limited goods than upper-class participants were. Notably, though, when both groups were exposed to a sympathy-eliciting video on child poverty, the compassion of the wealthier group began to rise, and the groups? willingness to help others became almost identical.
"Piff later told New York magazine, the rich are way more likely to prioritize their own self-interests above the interests of other people. They are, he continued, more likely to exhibit characteristics that we would stereotypically associate with, say, assholes."
Why the Rich Don't Give to Charity - Ken Stern - The Atlantic
The wealthiest Americans donate 1.3 percent of their income; the poorest, 3.2 percent. What's up with that?
Ken Stern Mar 20 2013, 9:50 PM ET
When Mort Zuckerman, the New York City real-estate and media mogul, lavished $200 million on Columbia University in December to endow the Mortimer B. Zuckerman Mind Brain Behavior Institute, he did so with fanfare suitable to the occasion: the press conference was attended by two Nobel laureates, the president of the university, the mayor, and journalists from some of New York?s major media outlets. Many of the 12 other individual charitable gifts that topped $100 million in the U.S. last year were showered with similar attention: $150 million from Carl Icahn to the Mount Sinai School of Medicine, $125 million from Phil Knight to the Oregon Health & Science University, and $300 million from Paul Allen to the Allen Institute for Brain Science in Seattle, among them. If you scanned the press releases, or drove past the many university buildings, symphony halls, institutes, and stadiums named for their benefactors, or for that matter read the histories of grand giving by the Rockefellers, Carnegies, Stanfords, and Dukes, you would be forgiven for thinking that the story of charity in this country is a story of epic generosity on the part of the American rich.
It is not. One of the most surprising, and perhaps confounding, facts of charity in America is that the people who can least afford to give are the ones who donate the greatest percentage of their income. In 2011, the wealthiest Americans?those with earnings in the top 20 percent contributed on average 1.3 percent of their income to charity. By comparison, Americans at the base of the income pyramid?those in the bottom 20 percent donated 3.2 percent of their income. The relative generosity of lower-income Americans is accentuated by the fact that, unlike middle-class and wealthy donors, most of them cannot take advantage of the charitable tax deduction, because they do not itemize deductions on their income-tax returns.
But why? Lower-income Americans are presumably no more intrinsically generous (or prosocial, as the sociologists say) than anyone else. However, some experts have speculated that the wealthy may be less generous that the personal drive to accumulate wealth may be inconsistent with the idea of communal support. Last year, Paul Piff, a psychologist at UC Berkeley, published research that correlated wealth with an increase in unethical behavior: While having money doesn't necessarily make anybody anything, Piff later told New York magazine, the rich are way more likely to prioritize their own self-interests above the interests of other people. They are, he continued, more likely to exhibit characteristics that we would stereotypically associate with, say, assholes. Colorful statements aside, Piff's research on the giving habits of different social classes while not directly refuting the asshole theory suggests that other, more complex factors are at work. In a series of controlled experiments, lower-income people and people who identified themselves as being on a relatively low social rung were consistently more generous with limited goods than upper-class participants were. Notably, though, when both groups were exposed to a sympathy-eliciting video on child poverty, the compassion of the wealthier group began to rise, and the groups? willingness to help others became almost identical.
