A Study of Low-Income Charitable Giving in London

an article by Roger Bennett (London Metropolitan University) published in Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly Volume 41 Number 5 (October 2012)

Abstract

This article presents the outcomes to a study of the charity donation behaviour of 771 low-income people residing in three socially-deprived Boroughs in inner-London.

It emerged that several variables known to affect (a) levels of charity giving and (b) choices of types of charity supported among the U.K. public as a whole also influenced the donation behaviour of the financially poor. In addition, it appeared that a participant’s sense of affinity with other low-income people and the degree to which the individual believed that the poor were unfairly treated by society at large exerted significant impacts on giving behaviour.

However, behaviour differed according to whether a low-income person was “better-educated” (i.e., possessed a qualification beyond the level normally obtained at the minimum legal school leaving age) or was less well-educated. The “very poor” did not donate a higher percentage of their incomes than the moderately poor.

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