Global Generosity Skyrocketed Last Year but Less so in the U.S.

A report based on a GivingTuesday research collaboration delivered hopeful news on global generosity, finding that 83.6% of people worldwide donated to others in some way last year.

But, in a surprising “double-whammy,” the recently released research also found that both the number of givers, and the dollars they donated, fell last year in the U.S. for the first time since 2010. Also, stock market declines in 2022 appeared to cause large donors everywhere to give less.

The research, titled “Rethinking Resilience: Insights from the Giving Ecosystem,” was compiled by GivingTuesday Data Commons, a project involving more than 300 organisations and more than 50 global data labs. The Data Commons looks at “giving behaviours, contexts and patterns, movement growth, and altruistic motivations” with a goal of determining and sharing best practices for driving philanthropy.

GivingTuesday began in 2012 as an effort to encourage charitable contributions on the Tuesday after Thanksgiving in the U.S., and has expanded into a global movement.

“Rethinking Resilience” gleaned data from Asia, Africa, Europe, South America, and North America, finding that 56% of people across the globe gave in at least three ways last year, including donating their time, donating things they owned, or providing money; also, 57% gave to all of the three types of recipients that the report tracked: formal charities, informal groups, and individuals.

The report “makes it clear that in many communities, giving to others is not an optional ‘extra’ but rather a first principle of community membership,” Woodrow Rosenbaum, chief data officer at GivingTuesday said in an introduction to the research.

The Data Commons goal, Rosenbaum said, is to “bring the same sorts of data-driven tools to the social sector that the business sector has had for decades.” These tools should help to counter what has become a narrow view of philanthropy.

“Our research reveals that broadening outreach and engagement to include previously under-represented demographics can significantly improve organizational resilience, especially in times of economic volatility and uncertainty,” Rosenbaum said.

The report found a significant rise in volunteering everywhere, which often happens when the economy is shaky. It also found that young people everywhere were “giving more often and in more ways” than older ones.

Overall, this global data gathering exercise revealed that giving can look far different country to country. The “most inescapable insight,” the report said, is that less wealthy countries were consistently more generous than wealthy ones. Kenya, for instance, demonstrated “a near universal commitment to generosity across all metrics,” with India as a close second.

In the U.S., the number of givers fell by 10%, driven by an 18% drop in new donors and a huge drop in donor retention: 26.4% from first-time donors and 3.5% from repeat givers.

Contributions by “major” philanthropists, who give between US$5,000 and US$50,000, and “supersize” ones who give more than US$50,000 fell the least, but because of the large size of their donations, the drop off was more keenly felt. Total dollar contributions fell by 1.7% last year.

The biggest decline among these philanthropists was in the fourth quarter of last year as a 20% drop in stocks took a toll. That fall off could be “the canary in the coal mine,” the report said. “Should large donors suddenly retreat further, the impact on an unprepared social sector could be devastating.”

The message to nonprofits is to actively build a wider, more diversified base of support beyond big philanthropists to “strengthen resilience and reduce the adverse effects of steadily growing competition for a shrinking pool of increasingly cautious large donors who may be retreating in the face of economic uncertainty and volatility,” the report said.

For many Australians, the 2026 Federal Budget initially felt like a direct challenge to the way wealth is created, held and transferred between generations.

The headlines were immediate: changes to capital gains tax, reforms to discretionary trusts, restrictions on negative gearing and increased scrutiny of investment structures. Unsurprisingly, affluent families, business owners and investors began asking the same question:

Is the way we hold our wealth still fit for purpose?

In recent days, the government has announced several significant amendments following industry consultation and public feedback, including exempting testamentary trusts from the proposed 30 per cent minimum tax and expanding capital gains tax concessions for small businesses.

The backdown is welcome. But it also highlights something much bigger.

This Budget has accelerated a conversation that many Australian families have been postponing for years.

The conversation is not really about tax. It is about wealth stewardship.

For decades, Australians have built wealth through businesses, property, investments and careful long-term planning. Yet many families have not revisited the legal structures surrounding those assets in years, sometimes decades.

We often see clients who have spent years building significant wealth, only to discover their legal arrangements no longer reflect their current circumstances.

Their children are now adults. They may own multiple properties.

They may have sold a business, entered a second marriage, become grandparents or accumulated digital assets that did not exist when their original estate plans were prepared.

The trust that distributes income may need to be reconsidered. The bucket company may no longer be so attractive.

The Budget has simply exposed a reality that already existed: wealth structures cannot remain static while life continues to evolve.

Importantly, trusts themselves are not the issue.

Trusts are legitimate planning tools that provide flexibility, protection and continuity. When used appropriately, they allow families to adapt to changing circumstances over time.

And neither is tax the issue, really. Getting the fundamentals right is more important for long-term, sustainable wealth than a few favourable tax treatments around the edges.

The real issue is complacency.

Too often, families create structures and assume the job is done. It isn’t.

Estate planning is no longer a document you sign once and file away in a drawer. It is an ongoing process that should evolve alongside your life.

We are also seeing a broader shift in how Australians define wealth itself. It is no longer just the family home and an investment portfolio.

Modern wealth includes businesses, digital assets, cryptocurrency, intellectual property, frequent flyer points and increasingly complex family arrangements.

At the same time, Australians are living longer than ever before, meaning wealth may need to support multiple generations simultaneously. This creates new responsibilities and new risks.

How do you help your children enter the property market without exposing family wealth to relationship breakdowns?

How do you structure wealth so that it remains a source of opportunity rather than future conflict?

These are the questions families should be asking now.

The recent debate surrounding testamentary trusts also serves as an important reminder that policy decisions can have unintended consequences for vulnerable Australians. It is encouraging that the government has listened to feedback and clarified its position.

But the lesson remains: the wealth landscape is changing.

Increasingly, governments, regulators and tax authorities are paying closer attention to how wealth is held and transferred. That means families cannot afford to adopt a “set-and-forget” approach to their structures.

The families who will be best placed for the future are not necessarily those with the greatest wealth.

They are the families with the greatest clarity. Clarity around ownership, succession and governance. And clarity around how wealth will transition from one generation to the next.

Ultimately, preserving wealth is not about avoiding change.

It is about preparing for it.

Because the greatest risk is not change itself.

It is losing the ability to respond to it.

Anthony Hunt is Co-Founder of Wealth Lawyers and former COO of Westpac Private Bank. He advises business owners, investors and affluent Australian families on wealth protection, succession planning and intergenerational wealth transfer

Global Generosity Skyrocketed Last Year but Less so in the U.S.

The Federal Budget may have softened some of its proposed tax reforms, but it has exposed a bigger issue: too many families are relying on wealth structures that no longer reflect the realities of modern life.