Americans Giving Less to Charity, Study Finds

By Meg Sommerfeld

Americans are giving less money to charity and volunteering less often than they were just a few years ago, a study released last week by a coalition of nonprofit groups says.

The average amount of money contributed by American households dropped from $978 in 1989 to $880 last year, according to the study, the fourth in a series of biennial surveys conducted by the Gallup Organization for the Washington-based Independent Sector.

Forty-eight percent of respondents said they volunteered last year--a drop of 3 percentage points from 1991 and 6 percentage points from 1989. Most of the decline was in helping on an informal basis, such as cooking for a...