Study Finds Increase in Charitable Donations by Puerto Rican Taxpayers after Charitable Contribution Deduction Limitations Were Removed

As reported by the Philanthropy News Digest, a recent analysis discloses that charitable gifts reported by taxpayers in Puerto Rico increased by about $5 million in the year following a change in the law that expanded the deductibility of charitable contributions.  The change in giving patterns varied among income groups (predictably in part, but perhaps surprisingly in some respects). A summary follows:

The report … analyzed tax data from the Puerto Rico Treasury Department for 2011 — the first year that individual taxpayers in Puerto Rico were allowed to deduct 100 percent of their donations to nonprofits, up to a maximum of 50 percent of their adjusted gross income — and found that the number of people who claimed a charitable deduction jumped from 27,644 in 2010 to 47,004, or 4.6 percent of all tax filers, in 2011. Previously, Puerto Rican taxpayers were only allowed to claim a deduction of 33 percent on their charitable donations, or 100 percent of their donations in excess of 3 percent of their adjusted gross income.

 

The report also found that while the number of taxpayers claiming a charitable deduction increased across all income groups, the average amount claimed fell some 39 percent, with the total increasing 7 percent and 27 percent among individuals with an adjusted gross income of between $25,000 and $50,000 and more than $150,000, respectively, and falling among those with an adjusted gross income of between $100,000 and $150,000 (-8 percent), $75,000 and $100,000 (-2 percent), $50,000 and $75,000 (-1 percent), and less than $25,000 (-9 percent).

A copy of the full report is available here.

JRB