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Audacity of Truth
More proof that the “liberals are more charitable than conservatives” Accepted Truth is a myth
John Stossel and Kristina Kendall add their own evidence to the pile already out there that debunks the old Accepted Truth about liberals supposedly being more generous than conservatives.
This is not to say that liberals in general don’t favor generosity – they’re just ok with being generous with other people’s money while, apparently, holding on to more of their own.
We might be crazy – but at least we’re more generous 
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13 Responses to “More proof that the “liberals are more charitable than conservatives” Accepted Truth is a myth”
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Libs are only more generous when it is not their money they are giving away. Seriously tho, look at what Al Gore reported giving on his income tax return. What was it like 200.00 bucks?? The man made over 150K in salary alone, didn’t pay rent, made money in his investments, but could only give away 200.00. But has no problem with taxing Social Security checks as income, something that never happened prior to Clinton, and these guys want me to believe that care about someone besides themselves. – Lorica
Those loony lefty liberals…they will always be willing to give you the shirt off someone else’s back.
It’s really no surprise at all. Think about it…most libs aren’t all that big on the idea of taking personal responsibility for your life. They think that if there’s a problem, then the government ought to step in and do something.
So if you’re not a believer in personal responsibility in your own life, then it follows that you probably won’t think you have a personal responsibility to help others, and therefore won’t donate as much to charities. You will, however, demand huge government outlays to solve any problems you think you see. And the money for those programs ought to come from “the rich”, which is defined as anyone who has a nickel more than you do.
Then you add to that the typical liberal’s animosity toward religions (OK, except for radical islam, the one religion they can apparently tolerate). One central belief in almost all organized religions is service to your fellow man, in part by giving of what God has blessed you with. So again, the average lib will likely avoid this influence.
All perfectly logical. I wasn’t surprised in the lest by the findings.
Liberals on average live in (more expensive) urban areas, while nearly 50% of all conservatives live in the (less expensive) south. So what I want to know is, did the writer compare apples to apples? Are his income groups set up to account for cost of living? When calculating percentage of income given to charity does he use income after taxes and cost of living?
According to CNN cost of living calculator:
Salary in New York (Manhattan) NY: $100,000
Comparable salary in Marshall County AL: $43,046.48
If you move from New York (Manhattan) NY to Marshall County AL…
Groceries will cost: 28.77% less
Housing will cost: 78.669% less
Utilities will cost: 41.379% less
Transportation will cost: 20.983% less
Healthcare will cost: 39.198% less
So at the end of the day, all those ‘rich’ city dwellers have a lot less money to give away than it seems. Rents are higher, food costs more, taxes are higher, etc.
If he does, then he needs to compare New York liberals who make $100,000 with Alabama conservatives who make closer to $40,000. I think we’ll see a much different picture.
I doubt you will, this is not the first study to point this disparity out, and it is completely consistent with the world view of liberals vs. conservatives. That is, who’s job it is to take care of things, the state vs. the individual.
So this feeds into a conservative myth.
What is interesting, is that conservatives complain about giving too much in taxes, but it is the red states that get back more from uncle sam than they give.
LINK
It’s like the liberals are subsidising the conservatives.
Well, good. Liberals should do something worthwhile, if what you say is true, it would be the only thing worthwhile they’re doing. It still doesn’t compensate for the things they are harming though.
Everyone assumes the libs are the working class, and the conservatives are rich. John Kerry, Barbara Streisand, Ted Kennedy, Ted Turner, are pretty wealthy libs.
Yeah, liberals typically divide into overeducated rich “elites” and poor people wanting handouts from government. An awful lot of the working class are really far more conservative than that.
But you know, it’s only the evil conservative Republicans that are rich.
You know, Sid makes the typical, shallow liberal mistake of assuming he really knows what we are like down here in these dumbass, backwards “red” states. He opines that liberals live in the big cities in the North and on the West coast, and they have to suffer from a high cost of living, while all us dumbass hicks down here in flyover country are just rolling in money due to the low cost of living. I got news for you sid, we do have large cities in flyover country and the South, with high costs of living. And if you want to see really poor people, look outside the cities in the rural areas. Yeah, land and housing are “cheap” compared to a big city, but the wages are even lower, and in many rural and flyover country places jobs are harder to come by. Yet these dirt poor people, often working low paying jobs in areas without good employment opportunities (unless you consider meat packing, farming, etc. “good” high paying jobs) manage to give more to charity than the liberals. Come look at the people who go to church every Sunday, drive 20 year old cars and pickup trucks, work multiple jobs, and yet still make the effort to give to others.
The main difference is a lot more people in flyover country are “working class” who actually have a work ethic, as opposed to welfare class so rampant in the liberal enclaves. New Orleans is a perfect example of what happens when liberal democrats are allowed to foster and maintain a culture of dependency, poor who think they don’t have the responsibility to take care of themselves. Magnify this by several fold and you have the inner city in most of his beloved blue enclaves.
There are poor people in both places, but their attitudes are markedly different, and the most dirt poor people I’ve ever seen are not in cities.
Listening to the author on Medved, he stated that any way he looked at the subject, no matter what the criteria, no matter what was the target of giving, libs were always the cheapskates. It may be a tough pill to swallow, Sid, but it might ease your suffering to be more generous and get your lib friends to do so as well.
Sorry. The author to which I was referring, and who was also a major source of the Stossel piece, is Arthur Brooks and the book is, “Who Really Cares?”