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Annual donations to charity per year in the US are in excess of 400 Billion (so about 1000x more than your off the cuff estimate). Rather than being a rounding
by harryh 7y ago
Annual donations to charity per year in the US are in excess of 400 Billion (so about 1000x more than your off the cuff estimate). Rather than being a rounding error in the military budget, this is about 2/3rds of total.
- lmm 7y ago> Annual donations to charity per year in the US are in excess of 400 Billion Yes, but how much of that is "social support" versus, say, wealthy people structuring expenditures they were going to make anyway to be more tax efficient.
- harryh 7y agoThere are some stats here on where the money goes: https://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=content.view&cpid=42 https://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=content.view&... I'm not really sure what "wealthy people structuring expenditures they were going to make anyway" even means.
- taejo 7y agoIf Richie McMoneybags was going to buy a million-dollar painting, but instead decides to donate those million dollars to the McMoneybags Museum of Million-Dollar Art That Richie Wanted to Buy Anyway (that's in a wing of Richie's house and is only open to the public once a year), that probably counts.
- harryh 7y agoNo, it does not count. The IRS isn't stupid.
- taejo 7y agoExcuse my mistake, the McMoneybags Museum is not in a wing of Richie's house but down the road, and it's open not once but twice a year (or by appointment). https://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/11/business/art-collectors-gain-tax-benefits-from-private-museums.html?_r=0 https://www.nytimes.com/2015/01/11/business/art-collectors-g... The IRS isn't stupid, but they also don't have the resources to audit everyone who makes a dodgy claim.
- tptacek 7y agoYou answered his question but didn't rebut his data, which shows that arts contributions are a small fraction of total charitable giving, almost half of which appears to go into services for people (health, education, human services), followed by religious giving.
- lmm 7y agoIs there any reason to believe that "donations" in those categories are less likely to yield similar personal benefits for the "donor" than those categorized as art?
- rdtwo 7y agoThink Clinton foundation and everyone else’s similar personal “charity”