January 15, 2009 | Read Time: 1 minute
Deductions for charitable contributions in 2006 declined after adjusting for inflation, according to statistics released by the federal government.
Americans deducted $186.6-billion in charitable gifts in 2006, 1.8 percent more than the $183.4-billion in charitable deductions they claimed in the 2005 tax year, the Internal Revenue Service reported.
After adjusting for inflation, the total deductions for charitable contributions fell 1.4 percent in 2006 — the first decline since 2002. The average total contributions claimed on tax returns increased to $4,504 in 2006, a 1.6-percent increase over the 2005 figure of $4,432. The percentage of tax returns that included write-offs for donations also fell slightly, from 30.8 percent of filings in 2005 to 29.9 percent in 2006.
The information is published in the IRS’s Statistics of Income Bulletin for the fall of 2008, and is available online.
