Jews are among the most philanthropic people in America. Just not so much with each other.
That’s one way of spinning the data in a study of Jewish foundations conducted by the Institute for Jewish & Community Research in San Francisco. Among the findings, of the $1.2 billion doled out by leading Jewish foundations, a lot less went to Israel and Jewish causes than one might think.
“We did not go into [the study] with any set of expectations,” said Gary Tobin, president of the IJCR. “I was surprised by the relatively low amount of giving of grants to Israel. And in truth, if you aggregate all these foundations, only 20 percent went to Jewish causes. That surprised me.”
The 56 foundations profiled range in assets from $500,000 to $2.5 billion and are spread out across the country. The one common criterion: All were established by a Jewish individual, couple or family.
Several local foundations made the list, including the Richard and Rhoda Goldman Philanthropies, the Bernard Osher Philanthropies, the Koret Foundation and the Walter and Elise Haas Fund.
Tobin and his researchers examined data from 2004 and 2005. They found 79 percent of total dollars went to secular organizations, 21 percent to Jewish organizations.
Why the gap?
“America has been a very giving country,” said the IJCR’s Aryeh K. Weinberg, a co-author of the study. “Jews are among the most charitable. They look for opportunities to give something back. Jews not only feel obligations to give to other Jews and to Israel, they wouldn’t have the money to give if this country had not allowed them to have that success.”
The study’s authors do not “advocate for foundations to give to Jewish causes or secular causes,” but presented the data “for discussion and debate.”
Richard Goldman of the Richard and Rhoda Goldman Philanthropies was shocked by the findings.
“I was so surprised that Jewish funders don’t give more to Jewish causes,” said Goldman, whose foundation gave out nearly $50 million in 2004 and 2005, with 32 percent of that allocated to Jewish causes. “But we’ll do our part.”
Weinberg, a Bay Area native, was pleased that the home team was among the top givers to Jewish causes. “The locals stacked up well,” he said. “I would have thought we’d come out at the bottom, but Koret and Goldman carried it pretty far.”
About 47 percent of Koret Foundation dollars allocated went to Jewish causes.
Tobin and his colleagues had to define what exactly constituted a Jewish cause. For example, a public university is considered secular, even if the funded program was, say, a Jewish studies department.
Most of the foundations in the study have been in existence for 25 years or less, and still have living benefactors who care about Jewish causes, Tobin said.
Yet the Annenberg Foundation, the largest of those studied, with assets of $2.5 billion, gave no dollars to Jewish causes. On the other hand, 25 of the foundations distributed at least a quarter of their assets to Jewish causes.
“The further the foundations get from the founding donor, the more likely it is that they will move away from the wishes of the founding donor,” Tobin said. “The founding donor might care a lot about Jewish causes, but his grandchildren or spouse or children might not.”
Jeffrey Solomon, president of the Andrea and Charles Bronfman Family Foundation, said he knows of one foundation whose benefactor wanted to spend all of its money in Israel.
Two generations after he died, none of the trustees are Jewish and the foundation does spend money in Israel — on causes relating to Israeli Arabs.
“It is a well-known sad fact of philanthropy that donor intent cannot be managed from the grave,” said Solomon, whose foundation was included in the study.
That can go both ways. “I’m sure the very conservative, curmudgeonly Henry Ford would be appalled about the $20 million that went to the New Israel Fund and other liberal causes the Ford Foundation gives to,” noted Tobin.
While Tobin adopts the dispassionate nature of a scientist while conducting his research, he drops the impartiality when it comes to Jewish community survival.
“I don’t believe foundations should be saving money for a rainy day,” he said. “Because it’s always raining somewhere. And it’s always going to rain. One has to trust that every generation of Jewish Americans will continue to give.”
JTA writer Jacob Berkman contributed to this report.