The Charities Aid Foundation recently did a 10 year trend analysis of giving around the world. While Canada ranks as one of the top 10 countries in their study, there is concerning news.

Levels of giving in the USA and Canada are trending downwards over recent years.

The USA peaked in our CAF World Giving Index 2014 with a score of 64%, but then saw a steady decline in the next three reports, reaching as low as 56% in World Giving Index 2017. There was a very slight increase to 58% in World Giving Index 2018 but still lower than the four year period between 2013 and 2016. Overall, therefore, the USA has been on a downward trend in recent years.

Canadian giving has been declining since 2014

Canada has also seen a steady decline since the 2014 World Giving Index and the decline has been more pronounced than in the United States, falling below the 50% mark for the first time in World Giving Index 2018, which was an 11 percentage point drop since it peaked in World Giving Index 2015. Canada’s overall 10 year score is thus particularly dependent on its stronger performance in the first five years of the World Giving Index.

American tax changes in 2017 will be a good case study

It will be key to see how the USA and Canada perform over the next few years with their overall high scores being held up by the early year scores on the World Giving Index. We will also be looking to see how the USA fares, especially in terms of donating money, in the wake of the 2017 tax overhaul which has resulted in millions of Americans no longer claiming a specific charitable deduction for their donations through their tax return.

This is an excerpt of the CAF’s World Giving Index, 10th Edition. To read the full, international, report, click here.

At CAF, we exist to make giving go further, so together we can transform more lives and communities around the world. We are CAF and we make giving count.