Viral Finances

With all of the bad news about the COVID economy--millions loosing their jobs or being furloughed--you would expect that non profit finances would tank, and some have.  But Americans are still giving.  A recent survey of 1,000 U.S. adults cited in the Chronicle of Philanthropy and performed by the online gift processor Classy found that nearly 40% said they are likely to give more in 2020 than they did in 2019.  Only 9% said they expect to give less. Nearly 40% of respondents said they changed how they gave this year because charities needed their dollars more now than they did before the public-health emergency. 

That's nationwide and covering many types of charities.  So how has Paraclete fared?  It depends on where you look. In the pandemic months of March - September 2020, mission-wide giving to to Paraclete, compared to the same period in 2019, is up 35.4%!  That is an amazing, and unexpected figure!  But it doesn't tell the whole story.  Paraclete finances have always been driven by the arrival of new associates, all of whom are fund raisers, and that is still true in a pandemic.  But if we look at existing associates, those who were similarly active in Paraclete for both 2019 and 2020, giving for the group is down 5.7% for the same period!  

That is a manageable decline for our veteran associates.  For some, the shortfall actually resulted in a net gain, since travel expenses declined more in the period than income did.  But these are averages.  The experience of a given associate might be dramatically different. 

On December 1 I got a letter from the President and CEO of Charity Navigator, Michael Thatcher, commending Paraclete for earning four stars with the charity rating service (their highest) for the 7th year in a row.  He said that this is something earned by only 7% of the charities they rank.  There are other nonprofit rating and accrediting services.  We only work with Charity Navigator (the largest) among the secular services and ECFA as a Christian service.  I don't want to run after ratings form every service that comes along.  There is more important work to be done!