I think this might be an american phenomenon. I live in Germany and almost everyone I know is doing some non-profit work on the side, it's pretty common here.
It is not. The people of the United States give not only the most money to charity in the world per capita, but also score very highly on World Giving Index (we are #2), which accounts for time spent helping others and working for charitable organizations. We are a very charity oriented country.
I've always heard that that's predominantly religious giving, but never actually looked to see whether that's true til now.
It turns out, it is:
> Historically, Religious groups have received the largest share of charitable donations. This remained true in 2016. With the 2.9% increase in donations this year, 31% of all donations, or $127.37 billion, went to Religious organizations. Much of these contributions can be attributed to people giving to their local place of worship.
> In 2016, the majority of charitable dollars went to religion (32%), education (16%), human services (12%), grantmaking foundations (11%), and health (9%).
So Americans technically give a lot to charity, but it's mostly to tax-advantaged local religious institutions, who may or may not be doing anything with that; I'm sure some churches do something for their local community to merit that tax advantage, but I'm sure others don't. There's a lot of big buildings out there with crosses on them.
It is a tithe because it is a percentage of income that goes to the church. But it’s implemented through a tax collected by the government and withheld from paychecks. It would be unconstitutional in the U.S., but it’s a thing in Germany and some Scandinavian countries.
You mean the churches that, in turn, use that money to help their communities in a charitable way? I doubt that would surprise anyone anywhere in the world, since it happens everywhere.
This is a thing I've seen said a lot, but I'm curious if it's been studied. And I don't mean this as snark, but has anyone looked at what kind of "good works" churches do for their local communities?
I'm very curious to know whether our government (state, local, etc) is getting a fair exchange for the tax benefits of being a church.
> And I don't mean this as snark, but has anyone looked at what kind of "good works" churches do for their local communities?
Well - some of them provide political platforms to inform their members who to vote for. I think the IRS looked into this at one point, though it didn't go that well [1].
[1]: To this day, it's claimed that it was partisan and targeted only one party, when in fact all non-profits were looked into; it was just that certain non-profits, which attracted members of mainly one party, were the ones mostly engaging in such practices. That party, of course, made sure the IRS didn't have somebody (by not confirming anyone to the position - which is still the same today) to look into this issue; without that person, the law has no teeth, and they can continue to (illegally) promote their own politicians, in violation of the law for non-profit organizations. But they claim "free speech" rights and "religious freedom" rights...
Many replies are vouching for churches, but while religious community work is certainly beneficial to selected parties, it's only a little better than other forms of private philanthropy in that the services are selected by a limited number of participants, to benefit a limited number of participants, rather than democratically as a government would do. [-1]
For example, in cases like the Salvation Army, a portion of donated money goes toward lobbying against certain types of free speech. And they have been caught many times discriminating against LGBTQ. [0]
[-1] Not that governments are uniformly perfect. They are at least beholden to the majority at numerous pressure points, unlike churches.
And some of that goes out to support their surrounding communities by feeding/clothing homeless, supporting foster children, cleaning up yards for the elderly, paying people's rent, etc. A lot of churches don't require people to members in order to receive this help.
There are estimates that the Catholic Church spends around 3% of turnover on charity - which is far less than most charitable organisations do, and certainly far less than it could afford to.
Given the age slant of its members a lot of donations are collected from the elderly, many of whom can realistically be considered poor themselves.
The US has the highest level of wealth inequality in the world, so assuming that the ultra-rich donate more, their impact should be higher in the US than anywhere else.
I think I want income inequality. Wealth inequality might be totally meaningless as wealth is guesstimate not exact value usually, e.g. look here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_distribut..., is hard to say anything at all from Gini Wealth. Zimbabwe and Denmark can be compared by Gini index but that's completely nonsensical result: one corrupt and one happiest country in the world.
I have mentioned law of large numbers because of population size, however rich ultra-rich might be that can't skew results in USA.
Americans are expected to do unpaid internships as well, but instead of being supplemented by government-paid tuition and a stipend, we have to get financing from a college fund (if our parents are well-off) and/or student loans (which we'll be paying off well into middle age).
i have a pretty calvinist background, so i may be poorly calibrated.
whats wrong with that? i create therefore i am. what else would you live for - consumption? comfort? to be there so no one else marks your territory? genuinely curious.
i have a pretty anti-calvinist, though thoroughly religious, background.
What's wrong with that is that Work is not God, and therefore cannot be that which justifies you (and in fact, you justify it!). Taken to extremes, work-as-that-which-i-live-for is a not very subtle idolatry, and that usually winds us up in boot-stomping-on-face-forever territory in more or less short order.
I mean this in the least greeting-card-glurgey way possible: The thing we live for isn't work, it is love.
...This circumstance constitutes in itself the most eloquent "Gospel of work", showing that the basis for determining the value of human work is not primarily the kind of work being done but the fact that the one who is doing it is a person. The sources of the dignity of work are to be sought primarily in the subjective dimension, not in the objective one.
Such a concept practically does away with the very basis of the ancient differentiation of people into classes according to the kind of work done. This does not mean that, from the objective point of view, human work cannot and must not be rated and qualified in any way. It only means that the primary basis of tbe value of work is man himself, who is its subject. This leads immediately to a very important conclusion of an ethical nature: however true it may be that man is destined for work and called to it, in the first place work is "for man" and not man "for work". Through this conclusion one rightly comes to recognize the pre-eminence of the subjective meaning of work over the objective one. Given this way of understanding things, and presupposing that different sorts of work that people do can have greater or lesser objective value, let us try nevertheless to show that each sort is judged above all by the measure of the dignity of the subject of work, that is to say the person, the individual who carries it out. On the other hand: independently of the work that every man does, and presupposing that this work constitutes a purpose-at times a very demanding one-of his activity, this purpose does not possess a definitive meaning in itself. In fact, in the final analysis it is always man who is the purpose of the work, whatever work it is that is done by man-even if the common scale of values rates it as the merest "service", as the most monotonous even the most alienating work.
What do you need to live "for" something? I haven't yet reached retirement so it's pure speculation, but I suspect having no obligations and just hanging is pretty good. Maybe not great, but to me it looks better than the world of work for pay.
BTW I looks to me that my view is in the majority - I don't have the data, but I think that the majority of people just stop working after they reach retirement - i.e. they stop paid work as soon as they can (which means that doing nothing is better than work for them).
