Not to be a Debbie Downer, but columnist looks at Giving USA's 2014 stats, notes that giving may be up, but as percentage of GDP it's been stagnant for 20 years.
"Americans' generosity hit new highs in 2014—kind of. Charitable giving in 2014 totaled $358.38 billion, a 7.1 percent increase in current dollars, according to the Giving USA Annual Report, published by the Giving USA Foundation. Even adjusted for inflation, that figure represents a slight increase from the $355.17 billion given in 2007, before the recession. That's great, as far as it goes. But giving has not increased significantly as a percentage of GDP in almost 20 years, hovering right around 2 percent all that time." -- Kelley Holland, CNBC.com
