Philanthropy thought experiment

I had a great preview of the Blueprint 2013 yesterday with the staffs of the Stanford Social Innovation Review and the PACS Center. Among other things, we "crowdsourced" some ideas:

• The majority of the group thinks that the charitable tax deduction rules will change in 2013,
• They agreed with me (out of courtesy) that almost everything can be made into a data question, and

• We wondered which would have a greater effect on charitable giving, getting rid of the tax deduction or removing the ability to give anonymously. What do you think?

See that little widget over on the right side column headed "Thought Experiment Poll?" (mobile/email/RSS readers, you'll have to go to blog to see the poll widget)

Vote for "End charitable tax deduction" or "End anonymous giving" as bigger negative influence on giving rates and I'll report out on the findings in a week or two.


A little data to inform your vote.

According to Indiana University, as reported by the Foundation Center, the proportion of giving that is done anonymously ranges between 3 - 5 % of "big gifts." This doesn't capture any of the anonymity motivation that drives people to donor advised funds, nor does it capture smaller gifts (under $1 million).

As for the impact of the charitable tax deduction, well, the waves are awash with opinion and a little bit of data:

• Here's a rundown of three studies done last year (with links to the studies. Mostly academic research)
• Here's the report posted by the White House a week ago. (Part of a campaign for a particular policy proposal)
• Here's the Bank of America/Indiana University survey of high net worth donors.  (Research funded by a vendor serving the market)