‘Tis the season to be generous.
But throughout the year, warmhearted Americans put the United States near the top of the most giving nations in the world, according to a newly released scorecard.
The World Giving Index, compiled by the Charities Aid Foundation, ranks 145 countries on how generous their general populations are in charitable activities.
The United States came in at No. 2, behind Myanmar.
“The impulse to give, to help others if you can, is a natural human instinct,” John Low, the foundation’s chief executive, writes in the forward. “Many factors affect the capacity and willingness of people to give.”
The World Giving Index calculates scores in three categories: helping a stranger, donating money, and volunteering time.
The index “attempts to generalize about what makes a nation generous,” Low writes, adding:
The aim of the index is to track how rates of giving change year by year and to stimulate debate about why rates of giving differ between nations and how we can encourage more people to give, in whatever way they can, to help others and strengthen society.
Many of the top 20 countries are developing nations, The New York Times reports.
“As the World Giving Index demonstrates repeatedly, across all different geographies and cultures, people universally appear to respond to those in need,” the index says.
Citizens of Myanmar, rated the No. 1 most generous country, emphasize giving as part of their daily lives.
“Fund-raisers parade through cities on trucks or wander the streets with loudspeakers that blare pleas for donations,” Thomas Fuller, southeast Asia correspondent for The New York Times, tells his newspaper.
“The donations are small but frequent, and have significant religious meaning,” the Times notes.
The United States falls closely behind Myanmar and is followed in rank by New Zealand, Canada and Australia.
The bottom five, in descending order: the Palestinian Territory, Lithuania, Yemen, China and Burundi.
Although Myanmar leads in donating money and volunteering time, the U.S. leads the pack of the top 20 countries in the category of helping a stranger.
The index was based on data assembled in 2014. In last year’s index, the United States and Myanmar tied for the top spot.
Globally, the most notable movement in giving is donating money. Between 2013 and 2014, there was an uptick of 3.2 percentage points in monetary donations.
On average, over the past five years, 2.2 billion people worldwide in the countries surveyed participated in helping a stranger, 1.4 billion donated money, and 0.9 billion volunteered time each year, according to the index.
“In a world still riven by conflict, war and uncertainty, that natural desire of people to help others is something which we should cherish and nurture,” Low writes.
