[mbiondi]

Yes, this a big part of how Colleges and Universities are funded.

Alumni tend to contribute either to leave a legacy behind or to help the College maintain it's reputation, which in turn helps the alum's reputation for having graduated from there.

[gruez]

>to help the College maintain it's reputation, which in turn helps the alum's reputation for having graduated from there.

Surely this can't work without some aultrism involved? I find it doubtful that any alumni can get 10k of benefit from the increased reputation that a 10k donation can provide.

[dragonwriter]

> I find it doubtful that any alumni can get 10k of benefit from the increased reputation that a 10k donation can provide.

Declining marginal utility, and how rich the people who tend to make big donations are, play a role here.

[toyg]

It’s the sort of transaction that typically lowers your taxable, effectively saving money to the donor.

[frobozz]

That's not how reducing your taxable income works.

If you earn 50K, you net 37640. 51K and you get 38220.

If you earn 51K and donate 1K, you net exactly the same as if you just earned 50000. i.e. 580 less than if you had just kept it (If you had put it in your pension instead, you would have kept the whole 1000)

There may be some circumstances where it makes a difference, where certain thresholds could be crossed, but AFAIK, the way they all taper prevents that.

You can only get a tax break on 40K of pension contributions, so if you earn 91-101K and claim child benefit, without another pre-tax vehicle to soak up the rest, you'd have to pay the clawback charge. However, I doubt that would work. With 3 children you'd have to donate 10K to save about 2.5K.

If you earn something around 300K, it might do something because of the tapered pension allowance. Again, I doubt it. At 250K, if you donate 10K, you can put an extra 5K in your pension. Above that, I don't think there are any more thresholds.

[toyg]

You assume the funds are disbursed by individuals rather than vehicles, you don’t specify which legislation you’re considering, etc etc etc. I don’t think you have enough facts here to start crunching numbers. In the UK for example there is Gift Aid for individuals: https://financial-coaching.co.uk/blog/post/self-assessment-a...

A number of schemes exist around various countries to promote incentives to donate, and they typically end up with people paying less tax overall than they would otherwise. (Note: I don’t think it’s a bad thing, no critique meant).

[frobozz]

Yes, you pay less tax overall, but the reason for that is that the money is treated as having been given to the charity pre-tax. It does not make your net income go up.

In the illustration in your link, Sue gives 1k to charity, and as a result, and pays 350 less tax. This means that, as a result of this donation, her net income has fallen by 650.

I did not provide the specific names of all the rules, but I thought that would be obvious from the numbers, context, and some of the terms

I had not considered the difference between payroll giving (my first example,give 1k before tax, charity gets 1k, your taxable income is 1k less), and claiming back (you give 1k after tax, charity gets 1.25k, you reclaim some of the tax you paid), but payroll giving is more efficient for the donor, as they pay zero tax on the donation, rather than basic rate, as in the reclaim method.

There is no UK legislation, as far as I know, that reduces your tax bill by more than your donation.

[frobozz]

Briefly, my point is that tax efficient charitable donation schemes can only be said to benefit the donor if you start with the assumption that part of their lifestyle includes the charities getting a certain amount. E.g. if I want the charity to get 1.25k, I only have to spend 1k for that to happen.

The schemes amplify the effects of existing altruism, rather than offering incentives to persuade non-donors to donate.