The Relationship Between Giving and Volunteering
A clear trend has emerged from this survey series: volunteers give more than non-volunteers. Contributing households with at least one family member who volunteers give a much higher percentage of their household income than contributing households that do not have a volunteer. Over the six surveys, contributing households with a volunteer gave more than twice the percentage of household income than contributing households in which the respondent did not volunteer. In 1998, 47% of households contributed and had a volunteer. These households gave an average of 2.5% of their household income, compared with 1.2% among the 23% of households that contributed but did not volunteer. Even in periods of uncertain economic conditions as in 1991 and 1993, this relationship held. The average percentage of household income given by contributing households in which the respondent volunteered was 2.6% in both years, while the percentage of income given by contributing households in which the respondent did not volunteer was 1.4% in 1991 and 1.1% in 1993. The proportion of contributing households with a volunteer declined gradually from 48% in 1989 to 43% of all households in 1993 and 1995. Contributing households in which the respondent volunteered gave 72% of total household contributions in 1987, 81% in 1991, 80% in 1995, and a high of 84% in 1998.

A second trend that emerged was that as the percentage of volunteers increased, giving rose, and in times of economic recession or uncertainty giving did not decline as significantly. The proportion of the population that volunteered increased from 45% to 54% between 1987 and 1989, then declined to 48% in 1993, held steady at 49% in 1995 and has now reached its highest level ever at 56%. These volunteer percentages translated into an increase in the number of adults volunteering from 80 to 98 million between 1987 and 1989, after which it declined to 89 million in 1993. In 1995, the number of volunteers increased to 93 million. Subsequently, the number has increased by 16.4 million to 109.4 million. In each of the survey years, volunteers reported household contributions that were two to four times higher than that for non-volunteers. In 1998, volunteers reported average household contributions of $1,339, compared with $524 for non-volunteers. Household contributions reported by volunteers represented 2.5% of household income in 1998, compared with 1.2% among non-volunteers .