A new AP-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research survey conducted in early December shows that about 50 % of U.S. adults have already made their charitable contributions for the year. Only 18 % say they have donated and will donate again before the year ends, while 6 % report they haven’t given yet but plan to do so by December’s end. The remaining 30 % have not donated and do not intend to.
Donors Face Competing Priorities
The poll highlights the many urgent causes that have drawn donors’ attention this year. President Donald Trump’s cuts to social-services grants, severe foreign-aid rollbacks, a November freeze of SNAP benefits, and natural disasters such as Los Angeles’ historically destructive wildfires created a crowded field of needs. At the same time, weaker income gains and steep price inflation left lower-income households with less money to redistribute. Other surveys have also found a years-long decline in the number of individuals who give.
New Tax Incentives May Spur Giving
Trump’s tax and spending legislation offers an extra incentive to give more starting in January. Most filers will see new charitable deductions next tax year of up to $1,000 for individuals and $2,000 for married couples. Some itemizers may make more gifts this year, ahead of a new floor for donation write-offs that takes effect in 2026.
December Is Still a Key Deadline
Despite the push for early giving, December remains a “very important deadline” for donors, said Dianne Chipps Bailey, managing director of Bank of America’s Philanthropic Solutions division. Bailey cited estimates from the National Philanthropic Trust that nearly one-third of annual giving happens in the final month. “December 31 does provide a target to make sure that they’ve given what they intended to give before the year is over,” Bailey said.
GivingTuesday vs. Black Friday
The well-known GivingTuesday, held the Tuesday after Thanksgiving, saw Americans donate an estimated $4 billion to nonprofits. Yet the poll found that Americans were much more likely to make a Black Friday purchase than a GivingTuesday gift this year. Just under half say they bought something for Black Friday, compared to about 1 in 10 who say they donated to a charity for GivingTuesday.
Oakley Graham, a 32-year-old from Missouri, explained the trend: “Black Friday gets the lion’s share of things,” he said. “And then you’ve got GivingTuesday a couple days later. Most people have probably spent all their spending money at that point.” Graham said his family has “definitely tightened the financial belt” in recent years. He and his wife are dealing with student-loan debts now that the Trump administration suspended their repayment plan. Their two young children are always growing out of their clothes. “It’s good if there’s anything left for savings,” he added.
He still tries to help out his neighbors-from handiwork to Salvation Army clothing donations. “Not that I’m not willing to give here and there,” he said. “But it seems like it’s pretty tough to find the extra funds.”
Checkout Giving Grows
Another avenue for nudging Americans to give is the checkout charity, which the AP-NORC poll found about 4 in 10 U.S. adults say they donated to a charity when checking out at a store this year. Among those is Graham. An outdoorsy person who enjoys hunting and fishing when he can, he said he is “always susceptible to giving for conservation” – likely rounding up once or twice at Bass Pro Shops for that reason.
“With the finances, I don’t do a lot of buying these days. But a couple cents here or there is like – I can do that,” he said. “It doesn’t sound like much. But I know if everybody did it would make a difference.” The poll also found older adults-those over 60-are more likely than Americans overall to donate at store checkouts.
Individual Giving Plans
One quarter of Americans plan to donate in the last weeks of the year. Chuck Dietrick, a 69-year-old architect from Texas, is one of them. He and his wife give monthly to Valley Hope, a nonprofit addiction-services provider where their son did inpatient rehab, and then support about eight other organizations with end-of-the-year gifts.
“We’re doing our own thing,” he said. “I don’t do Black Friday or Cyber Monday, either … So, I don’t do the GivingTuesday thing.” Dietrick estimates their household donated somewhere between $501 and $2,500. The Dallas-Fort Worth area couple mostly contributes to organizations that touched their lives or the lives of friends. He mentioned a Florida hospice that “did a super job” caring for his mother, the Disabled American Veterans, and the Wounded Warrior Project. “I would rather give a smaller amount of money to a variety of institutions that I care about rather than giving a big chunk of money to one,” he explained.
Funding Cuts Prompt Some to Give More
The AP-NORC poll also found that most 2025 donors say the amount they gave wasn’t affected much by this year’s federal funding cuts or the government shutdown, although about 3 in 10 say those situations did impact the charities they chose to support. Private donors mobilized millions to fill funding gaps, and hunger-relief groups saw donation totals spike last month, but many Americans did not respond with their pocketbooks to the nonprofit sector’s newfound pressures this year.
The cuts did compel Jeannine Disviscour to give more. The 63-year-old Baltimore teacher said, “I did not donate on GivingTuesday,” but “I did donate that week because I was feeling the need to support organizations that I felt might not continue to get the support they needed to get to be successful.” She estimates her household gave between $501 and $2,500. That included support for National Public Radio. Congress eliminated $1.1 billion allocated to public broadcasting this summer, leaving hundreds of NPR stations with a budget hole. She said she wanted to ensure journalism reached news deserts where residents have few media options.
Living in an area that is home to many refugees, Disviscour also donated her time and money to the Asylee Women Enterprise. She said the local nonprofit helps asylum-seekers and other forced migrants find food, shelter, clothing, transportation and language classes. “There is a gap in funding and there’s more need than ever,” she said. “And I wanted to step up. And it’s in my community.”
Poll Details
The AP-NORC poll surveyed 1,146 adults from December 4-8 using NORC’s probability-based AmeriSpeak Panel, designed to be representative of the U.S. population. The margin of sampling error for adults overall is plus or minus 4 percentage points.
Key Takeaways
- About half of U.S. adults have already made their 2025 charitable contributions, with only 18 % planning to give again before year’s end.
- Black Friday purchases outpace GivingTuesday donations, with roughly 50 % buying on Black Friday versus 10 % donating on GivingTuesday.
- Older adults and those with smaller monthly budgets are more likely to give at checkout, while many donors are using a “shotgun approach” to support multiple charities in December.
The poll underscores how economic pressures, policy changes, and the timing of major shopping events shape Americans’ charitable giving habits this year.
