Aussies Less Charitable? - Survey
5 December 2013 at 9:51 am
A new nationwide survey says Australians are giving less to charity, with the average annual donation amount dropping from $317 to $283 – a trend not seen in other research in 2013.
And donating online (26 per cent) still comes in second to ‘buying a small item as part of a theme week’ (42 per cent) as the preferred method of giving.
The survey of 800 Australians, conducted by Empirica Research in conjunction with disability Not for Profit the Summer Foundation, also revealed the number of people saying they never give money to charity had increased from 4 per cent to 7 per cent.
The results conflict with the latest NAB Charitable Giving Index which showed donations to Australian charities had grown by 2.5 per cent with an average annual donation of $312 per donor.
The Empirica Survey found that the top three motivating factors for donating were “to help others who are less fortunate”, which was the same leading motivator in 2012, having “a personal connection to the cause” and “wanting to give back”.
It found that there was an increase in those reporting that they donated “because it makes me feel good” (from 5 per cent to 10 per cent).
The two strongest deterrents preventing Australians from donating reflected last year’s Empirica results – money being “too tight” for families and concerns that donations will not go directly to those that need them.
The most common form of giving in 2013, again in line with 2012, was buying a novelty item to tie in with a charity’s theme week (58 per cent), and this is also the highest preferred form of giving (42 per cent), with donating online the second most preferred form of giving (26 per cent), which is most popular in the 25-34 year age bracket (42 per cent).
“We hope that the fall in charitable giving is an anomaly, and the innate generosity of Australians will once again come to the fore,” Summer Foundation CEO Dr Di Winkler said .
“For those of us working in the disability sector, it is a timely reminder that the National Disability Insurance Scheme has a long way to go until it is implemented across Australia in 2018-19, and we need to keep the wider community informed about the progress of the NDIS and what it means in reality for those people living with disability every day.
“There is still much work to be done to ensure that people with disability are included in society and live lives with dignity and purpose.”
To download the report, click here.
