3 Reasons Why 2011 Charitable Giving is Up

DALLAS--(EON: Enhanced Online News)--2011 charitable giving is up 9.7% through July but giving growth is projected to slow through year-end according to the Atlas of Giving™. Gifts from individuals, corporations, and foundations along with bequests have totaled $204.02 billion for the first 7 months of 2011. Atlas of Giving CEO, Rob Mitchell says that the current Atlas of Giving forecast shows that 2011 will finish with a 6.5% increase in giving over 2010.

“Continuing high unemployment is dampening giving results at nonprofits that rely on a large volume of small gifts from individual contributors”

“There are three principal reasons that giving is doing well this year,” says Mitchell. “First, despite its unprecedented volatility, the stock market is up more than 6% year to date. Second, the 2011 economy is growing – albeit sluggishly. Third, nonprofits have stepped up their promotion and fund raising efforts.”

According to the Atlas of Giving, the economy is the greatest contributing factor to U.S. charitable giving. Generally speaking, good economic news translates into good charitable giving news and bad economic news means bad things for charitable giving. The 2011 economy has been growing but very sluggishly.

Evidence of this giving growth is not hard to find. Donor Advised Funds at Fidelity, Schwab, and Vanguard have all reported record gifts and grants in 2011. Many Universities have also reported significant giving increases including Yale, the University of Pennsylvania, and Youngstown State.

“Continuing high unemployment is dampening giving results at nonprofits that rely on a large volume of small gifts from individual contributors,” Mitchell says. “These organizations would be well-served to use this environment to step up their efforts to diversify how they raise money and who they raise it from.”

The Atlas of Giving is also warning that political fundraising is putting increasing pressure on the charitable giving economy. Seasonal political giving consumes individual financial resources that are traditionally used for making gifts to charities and churches.

The full Atlas of Giving report is available for free viewing at http://philanthromax.com/atlas-giving OR http://www.scribd.com/doc/62982387/ATLAS-of-Giving-Report-July-2011.

The Atlas of Giving is the economic intelligence tool for charitable giving. It combines a charitable giving forecast with a report of monthly, quarterly, and annual aggregate charitable giving. Each month The Atlas of Giving provides an updated report that is utilized by nonprofit executives and providers to nonprofits and churches. For more information, visit www.atlasofgiving.com

The same methods that were used to create the Atlas of Giving can be employed to identify a unique forecasting algorithm that is specifically tailored to an individual nonprofit. Your organization’s giving history and other information is used with economic and demographic variables to develop a custom revenue model. The Atlas Custom models for benchmarking and forecasting are available for individual nonprofits or groups of nonprofits. These tailored algorithms create opportunities to increase charitable giving income and create significant budgeting efficiency. Atlas Custom forecasting tool creates efficiencies and opportunities.