What Motivates Americans to Volunteer?

By Leslie Lenkowsky

December’s announcement by the Bureau of Labor Statistics that 4 million more people had volunteered in 2003 than in the previous year was encouraging news for the Bush administration.

Starting with his inaugural address in January 2001, and continuing in his State of the Union messages and other speeches, the president has been asking Americans to devote more time to serving their country — at least 4,000 hours throughout a lifetime. The Bureau of Labor Statistics survey, the second in what is expected to become an annual series, was seen by the White House as a sign that they are responding. The increase in volunteering, President Bush said in a radio address last month, “is evidence of the new culture of service we are building in America, especially among young people.”

That may be true, though more than one year’s evidence will be needed to know for sure. But if Americans are indeed becoming more civic-minded, the question is, what happened?And did anything government do make a difference, a particularly important question for me, since I just finished two years working on the Bush administration’s initiatives to spur volunteering. That question is especially hard to answer.

For most of the 1990s, scholars and blue-ribbon commissions had been almost unanimous in warning that volunteering was declining in the United States and that Americans were, in the words of the Harvard professor Robert D. Putnam, “bowling alone.”

The outpouring of patriotic feeling following the 2001 terrorist attacks produced, it was said, only a short-lived willingness to serve, whether in the military or for nonprofit groups, which faded almost as quickly as bipartisanship in foreign policy.

The Bush administration itself had already endorsed the notion that Americans were in danger of becoming “spectators,” not “citizens,” in the president’s speeches and through a variety of policy proposals, including expanding national-service programs such as AmeriCorps and the Peace Corps, and starting the USA Freedom Corps, a White House council whose mission is to foster a culture of “citizenship, service, and responsibility.”

Are these measures working?

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics report, which was based on data from more than 60,000 households, the increase in volunteering meant that 63.8 million people 16 or older did unpaid work for an organization from September 2002 to September 2003. That was still less than a third — 28.8 percent — of Americans 16 and older. Among minorities, the less educated, families without children, and those in their 20s or older than 65, the rate of volunteering was lower than that. So, even if last year’s rise was not just a short-term fluctuation, but part of an upward trend, the relatively low percentage of Americans who volunteer seemingly shows that the nation still has a long way to go to build a “culture of service.”

Although the federal study did not try to measure the impact of White House policies, the data suggest that its efforts — especially its support for programs that enable schools to offer community-service opportunities as part of academic lessons — probably deserve some credit for last year’s increase.

The volunteering rate among teenagers rose by almost 2.6 percentage points to nearly 30 percent. Because they are paid stipends and receive other benefits, volunteers in national-service programs were not counted by the Bureau of Labor Statistics (and in any event, the Bush administration’s plans for expanding them have been controversial and are just beginning to come to fruition).

But the Bush administration’s efforts to stimulate volunteering may have been less important than its program for stimulating the economy. According to the volunteering statistics, people with jobs are more likely to give their time to charity than those without them; of the 4 million new volunteers, nearly 2.5 million also had paid employment.

The growing number of couples starting families after getting their careers under way may have made a difference as well: Parents with children have much higher rates of volunteering than other household heads. The aging of the population helped too, since while the elderly are less likely to volunteer than people in most other age groups, they contribute nearly 90 hours per year, on average, nearly twice as much as the population as a whole.

Still, neither presidential efforts nor economic and social changes can fully explain why Americans volunteer.

More than 60 percent of those who gave time last year served with religious, educational, and youth organizations, in most cases those with which they or their children were involved. Almost as many people decided to serve on their own as did the number who waited to be asked by an employer, friend, relative, or, for that matter, the president.

Moreover, many more Americans volunteer over their lifetimes than the number who did so last year. One-sixth of Americans over 16 volunteered in 2002, but not in 2003, owing chiefly to time constraints. Another large number volunteer “informally,” helping their relatives, friends, and others as necessary, without joining any organization. They do not show up in the government’s statistics.

All of which suggest that government efforts to foster a “culture of service” played only a small role in the rise in volunteering that occurred last year. Presidential leadership can be useful in reminding Americans of their civic duties, and government actions, such as supporting volunteer programs in schools or the Freedom Corps Web site that enables people to find volunteer opportunities, can make it easier for people to serve. Charities can help too by paying closer attention to how they can more effectively recruit and use volunteers.

But for most Americans, the decision to donate time or money is ultimately a personal one, motivated by what is really important to them, such as faith or family. What makes the tradition of volunteering so resilient is its close connection to people’s own lives and beliefs rather than to national programs or patriotic spirit. That even a major White House initiative makes only a small difference is actually a sign of the volunteering tradition’s strength.

Leslie Lenkowsky is professor of public affairs and philanthropic studies at Indiana University and a regular contributor to these pages. Until August, he was chief executive officer of the Corporation for National and Community Service, which oversees AmeriCorps and other volunteer programs. His e-mail address is llenkows@iupui.edu.