Education, religious groups gain most from giving strategy
ABC News
A new report is shedding light on what types of organizations are receiving the most donations from charitable funds that have been a hotbed of contention
The somewhat mysterious charitable giving strategy known as donor-advised funds is a point of contention in the philanthropic community, but a new report released Thursday is shedding light on what types of organizations benefited most from it in the past few years.
Donor-advised funds, which are similar to charitable investment accounts, allow donors to receive a tax deduction upfront without directly giving the money to a working charity. Though donors can't get the money back from these funds, the federal government doesn’t mandate them to disburse the money, leading critics to argue they've essentially become warehouses for charitable dollars.
The accounts, also referred to as DAFs, are housed at national organizations like Fidelity Charitable, as well as community foundations and other institutions. The study released by Indiana University and The Giving USA Foundation showed between 2014 and 2018, grants from DAFs were mostly given to education, religious and other public-society benefit organizations, like United Way and civil rights groups. By contrast, environmental and animal organizations received 5% of the grant dollars, the least of all the groups.
The findings mirror that of a similar study released by both organizations in 2018, which looked at data from 2012 to 2015.