The chart below shows that even though corporate giving as a percentage of pretax profits fluctuates significantly over time, personal giving as a percentage of disposable income is more sustained, and indeed has risen over the past 6 years as corporate donations have declined.


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This is not to belittle corporate giving. Banks and financial services firms have been some of our most generous donors over time, particularly Bank of New York Mellon (BK), Wachovia (WB), UBS (UBS), JPMorgan Chase (JPM) and Lehman Brothers, who together have supported us with nearly $500,000 each year.

We're particularly saddened by the Lehman situation, since it was generous with both donations and encouraging legions of staff volunteers to help our work -- and others' -- in improving the lives of New York’s less fortunate children and families. In 2005-2006 alone, Lehman worked on 5 projects in 4 of our community centers and schools.

Volunteers from JPMorgan mentor our kids and teach them financial literacy - a skill that will take on new importance moving forward. We’ve expanded literacy programs to reach children as young as third grade with our partnership with Minyanland. We don’t want this particular piece of history to repeat itself; the better financially educated our children are, the better the markets will function in the future.

Staff from UBS, Bank of America (BAC) and Bank of New York Mellon have all volunteered to enrich the lives of New York City kids, providing artistic and cultural enrichment, job readiness training, and event management. We salute them and wish them the best in these trying times.

Coming back to trends, we know corporate giving will decline, at least in the short term. We'll continue to rely on individual giving, the backbone of every charity and nonprofit organization in America. Keep the faith. Keep the trend. Please maintain your personal giving levels, even when it becomes a larger percentage of your disposable income. Volunteer more often, and help those in great need.

Remember that even when things seem dire, there are many out there in far worse situations.