Tracking Declines In Charitable Giving

Note: This is a summary of an older story from NPTtv about declines in charitable giving.

Overviews of charitable support for healthcare in Canada and the United States produce two very conflicting pictures. According to the Association for Healthcare Philanthropy, or AHP, charitable support dropped $944 million in the United States in 2009 when compared with 2008 levels, versus an increase of $56 million in Canada. The report focuses on AHP members' direct response fundraising programs on behalf of more than 2000 nonprofit healthcare facilities.
During the course of the 2009 fiscal year the efforts of AHP members yielded $7.6 billion in the US and $1.1 billion in Canada, compared with $5 billion and just over $1 billion respectively the previous year. According to William C. McGinly, president and CEO of AHP, "Whether the recession ended in 2009 is for economists to debate, but its ripple effect certainly continued to curtail the ability of donors to give. It means fundraisers will have to work harder and smarter." In the United States, the largest declines in giving were experienced in the area of cash donations, down $818 million from 2008 and secured pledged which declined $7 million over the year.