Giving and Volunteering, what religion does to the numbers
Whether you consider yourself more religious or more secular can determine how much of your money and time you give away for charity and organizations according to a study done by The Social Capital Community Benchmark Survey (SCCBS).
The study was undertaken in 2000 by researchers at universities throughout the United States and the Roper Center for Public Opinion Research. The data consist of nearly 30,000 observations drawn from 50 communities across the United States and asked individuals about their civic behavior, including their giving and volunteering during the year preceding the survey.
The first group that considered themselves more “religious” were those that attended religious services every week or more often. This group accounted for 33 percent of the sample. The second group that considered themselves more “secular” were those that attended religious services less than a few times per year or explicitly say they have no religion. This group accounted for 26 percent of the sample. The remaining 41 percent of the sample practice their religion occasionally.
Across the groups, 81 percent gave, while 57 percent volunteered.
Religious people are 25 percentage points more likely than secularists to donate money (91 percent to 66 percent) and 23 points more likely to volunteer time (67 percent to 44 percent).
They also found that it doesn’t matter what religion you associate with, as long as you consider yourself more religious does it matter. For example, those who attended religious services regularly, 92 percent of Protestants give charitably, compared with 91 percent of Catholics, 91 percent of Jews, and 89 percent from other religions.
In addition, the SCCBS data show that religion and secularism break down on ideological lines: Religious people are 38 percentage points more likely to say they are conservative than to say they are liberal (57 percent to 19 percent). In contrast, secular people are 13 points more likely to say they are liberal than to say they are conservative (42 percent to 29 percent).
The average annual giving among the religious is $2,210, whereas it is $642 among the secular. Similarly, religious people volunteer an average of 12 times per year, while secular people volunteer an average of 5.8 times.
There is a trend in the more religious people in giving back more. It’s hard to say why exactly. Some may believe that it is because the religious group wants to gain a more favorable place in heaven, or that the more secular group doesn’t like what the group stands for.
What can be said for certain is that religion has a significant impact on the amount of charity that is given.
