How much do you give to charity?

[blairhoney]

 I'm thinking of setting aside a portion of next year's income for charity, instead of just giving as the spirit moves me. How much do you give to charity annually? And how do you calculate it? Percentage of gross, percentage of net, dollar amount per month or per year? 

[laohaire]

Personally, I give $10 a month, flat. It's not much but it's what I'm comfortable with given our tight budget.

As for who I give it to, I don't have a plan, though I have a couple of fallbacks. In November, a friend of DH's was raising a very small amount ($100) for a charity, so we put our $10 toward that. Another time a local organization was fundraising, so we did that. Otherwise I give to either the lactation consultant (ours saved DD's very life, I think, and she is funded by donations and grants  - doesn't charge for services) or the animal rescue center.

So, for people with very tight budgets, I think 10% of savings might be reasonable. For people with a very comfortable amount of money, 10% of income might be reasonable. Since it's all up to you, it depends :)

[Petie1104]

We give about 6% gross and then supplement that with services and goods.  We are trying to work up to giving about 10% gross, but financially we aren't there yet.  We do require the kids to give 10% of their allowance to their tzedakah boxes each week (charity piggy bank I guess you could call it).  Plus we try to encourage them to give services and goods. 

[HollyBearsMom]

Hmm- I never thought of it as a percent. We allocate about thousand each year for charitable giving.  I give about $2-300 to our church each year, give approx $100 a year to 3 "big" charities and the rest is more random.

We do adopt 2-3 families at the holidays, donate routinely to the salvation army and big brother/sister, support out local no kill shelter (food, supplies) and a local woman's shelter (food, cleaning supplies, toys,etc) but these are not part of the $1K .

I also do a walk each year for the local food bank.

[cappuccinosmom]

We give ten percent of net (take home), and then ten percent of whatever else comes our way, tax refunds, gifts, etc.  We also have a set amount that we give every year to a specific organization for a specific purpose.  And beyond that, we give where we can or where we feel led.

[blairhoney]

Thanks for all the replies!

Do you guys siphon off X amount of each paycheck, or how do you do it? Do you give throughout the year or a lump sum quarterly or yearly?

[Llyra]

I give 2.5% to my church, at this point. Our church makes carefully considered contributions to a variety of organizations. That's % of our net income-- what comes in. I can't give more than that right now, because we barely pay our bills as it is. I would like to work us up to giving about 5%. I don't give to anybody else, except for things like putting a dollar in the basket if the Rescue Mission is outside the grocery store, or giving canned goods and stuff like that.

[rachieface]

We give about 7% of our net income, and we have it budgeted throughout the year.  Every month a set amount goes to our Compassion child and a missionary couple we support, and every week we have a certain amount set aside to give to church or to needs that come up, like a friend who needs monetary help, a stranger who needs a bus pass, various charities, etc.  So yes, a bit gets taken out of each paycheck.  We too are working on being more consistent with our giving! 

[Tumble Bumbles]

We give in a very similar fashion.

 

Originally Posted by cappuccinosmom 

We give ten percent of net (take home), and then ten percent of whatever else comes our way, tax refunds, gifts, etc.  <snip>   And beyond that, we give where we can or where we feel led.

[dejagerw]

We currently give about 8% of our net income to charity.  Most goes to our church.  We'd like to get that up to 10%, but this is where we are at right now.

[~Amy~]

We regularly give (automatic withdrawal set up with our church, large national charity & small local charity) ~$750/per month.  Annually, that works out to be just a little over 10% of our gross income.  We give some small random donations sometime too...door-to-door, one-time stuff at Christmas, etc.  

[sunnysandiegan]

We have a certain amount per year that we donate to charity. Our method is each of us chooses a charity in our own birthday month (three months) and we do a family charity once a year and we donate to DD's school once a year and then one additional charity is more random (saved for whatever comes up; there's always an opportunity somewhere along the line, but Christmas is the fallback). We give six months of the year, basically, but in our spending plan it is originally set up as monthly to hold that money in the "charity" category.

[Turquesa]

I haven't calculated what we're going to do this year, but it will be a lot less.  If you're especially frugal, recognize that volunteer work is also a very generous donation.