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May 19, 2009 at 08:00 PM
That’s just one trend noted by Fidelity Charitable Gift Fund’s President, Sarah Libbey, in a May 14 interview with Wealth Manager. In 2008, Gift Fund “took in $1 billion and also granted out $1 billion,” Libbey says, adding that the fund made its two-millionth grant out to a charity in December 2008. “Granting out a billion dollars in an economy like we have,” really demonstrates “the value of the donor-advised-fund [DAF].”
“Women are really in the driver’s seat,” Libby asserts, “when you think about who is making those decisions about either engaging in tax strategies but more importantly, giving strategies for the household.” Women also are more interested in making charitable giving a family goal, “engaging children,” in their family giving. One interesting finding of the study is that although when Gift Fund DAFs are opened 80% of primary donors are men and 20% are women, it is women who are calling in to find out “how to do the best research on a charity that they want to grant out to,” or about features they’d like to see added.
“High-income women,” with, for the purposes of this survey “an annual household income of $150,000 or more” are more likely than high-income men (16% vs. 10%) to use a DAF, “charitable remainder trust, or private foundation.” And 7% of high-income women are likely to fund their accounts with securities, compared with 3% of high-income men. In difficult economic circumstances, high-income women tend to give more to charitable causes (35%) “because the need is greater,” than high-income men (25%).
