P.E.I. charities concerned by survey showing fewer people giving money and time
CBC
A new survey confirms what some P.E.I. charitable organizations have been seeing on their bottom lines: Financial donations and volunteer hours are down over the last decade, by nearly a quarter.
The survey from Narrative Research showed that 63 per cent of Atlantic Canadians gave money to a charity last year, compared to 83 per cent in 2011. That's down 20 percentage points, or 24 per cent.
Volunteer hours in Atlantic Canada are also down, according to the survey results. About 32 per cent of Atlantic Canadians donated their time in 2022, compared to 54 per cent in 2011.
"Unfortunately, it's not really surprising. We've been seeing that trend happen for a while," said Andrea MacDonald, CEO of United Way of P.E.I.
"There's a lot of folks who might have given in the past, and aren't able to now," MacDonald said.
"There's lots of reasons in terms of inflation, cost of living, the housing market. So it can be a challenging time to give, and some of those folks actually are using services who might not have used [them] before."
MacDonald said it's challenging to make up for the drop in donations.
"There's a smaller amount of people, who tend to actually be giving more. So we do ask anybody who's in the position to be able to give, really to consider stepping up," she said.
"The other thing is people who might not be able to give a lot. We don't want to discourage that small donation."
MacDonald said it's also not surprising that the volunteer hours are down.
"Throughout COVID, the way people volunteered changed, or they maybe weren't comfortable being out in the community, which is understandable," she said.
"So that return back to volunteerism has been a little bit challenging."
The survey broke down the results by generation. It suggested 65 per cent of Baby Boomers continue making charitable donations, followed by Gen X (54 per cent), Gen Z (54 per cent), and Millennials (48 per cent).
MacDonald said it's not unexpected the older generation is able to give more, at a time of life when many are making higher salaries and have paid off mortgages.
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