New research supported by Paypal points to the fact that women give more to charity while earning 19% less than men, and as they age, women become more generous.
Since Paypal processes the payments for more than a half million charities, it has decided to release its first-ever annual insights on where, why, and how people are donating their money online. PayPal’s 2018 Global Impact Report found that in 2018, 55.1 million people from over 200 markets contributed $9.6 billion to more than 665,000 charitable organizations via PayPal.
Top Giving Trends
There is a lot to unpack in this research, but overall, an important finding of the study is that those who have less give more. The study found that “Donors in the low-income bracket ($0-$49,999K) give the highest percentage of their income to charities (0.63%) over any other income bracket.” Those with higher income levels ($125k+), only give 0.14% of their income on average.
Important Giving Differences by Gender
Paypal’s research highlights important trends in women’s giving that readers of Philanthropy Women will be interested to know about. The research shows that women donate more frequently than men (3.18 times per year for women vs. 2.84 times per year for men) and women 50 and over donate at a higher frequency than anyone else (3.58 times per year).
These giving trends were sourced between January 1, 2018 and December 31, 2018 and include all merchants internally defined as ‘charities’ or ‘other nonprofits’ by industry code. Demographic details used in the research were only available for about 45% of the U.S. donor base.
This research by Paypal provides a strong model for how corporations can use their power to highlight new information about women’s leadership in philanthropy. As more corporations become curious about giving trends and the rise of women’s giving, we hope to see an increase in corporations sponsoring the growth of knowledge about this important topic.
Gender Diversity at Paypal
Of note, gender diversity is also an issue internally at Paypal. See the graph below for further details. They started a new effort to improve these numbers which is outlined here.
Related:
Hot Topics and Trends for Women and Philanthropy, 2016: Women’s Giving Circles
The 12 Most Promising Trends in Women’s Philanthropy
Barajas-Román: For Equal Pay Day, Women’s Funds Urge More Action
