It’s interesting that Mr Aitkin’s article provokes commentary from nefarious conspiracy theorists to wealth bashing which sidetracks discussion of his premise.

America’s industrial development was created phases of enormous wealth generation a situation that relatively young Australia has not fully experienced.

Second, US wealth generation encompasses a wider diversity of industries, rail transportation, chemicals, mining, automobiles, steel and oil. For a variety of reasons Australia has not grown such a philanthropic base from equivalent national development, notwithstanding the enormous personal wealth generated to only second generation Australian mining families.

Third, the size of the US philanthropic market comprises ‘old money’ primarily located in US eastern states which predicates geographically selective donation patterns. As Mr Aitkin has alluded there exists a correlation with Victoria’s ‘old money’ establishments that are significant benefactors to Australian philanthropic causes although the donor pool cannot compare with the US.

Fourth, America operates highly professional fund raising campaigns and exhaustive donor research programs which are also aided by certain attractive tax offsets for donors and testators. People may snarl at the rich giving away their money but such donations do benefit not for profit or charitable recipients.

Fifth, millions of Americans are imbued with a strong moral imperative that they should support organisations and causes which themselves have contributed to their own values or financial well being. People may debunk such patronage as trivial moralising but it runs deep in the American psyche. Visit America and see how many houses fly the US flag. How many Australian flags did you pass on your way to work today? Admire it or hate it as mere nationalistic narrowness but most Americans possess greater national pride in their country than Australians..

What Australia lacks philanthropically is a deeper sense of responsibility that our wealth – both individual and national - is often derived from the effort and generosity of forebears and that that imperative of giving should continue.

Australia can never match the US philanthropic market. Our challenge is to develop an improved per capita basis of giving, a process that many leading Australian universities are well advanced to achieve

I appreciate the comments, which were thoughtful, and contributed to my increased knowledge.

If I were writing again I would stress the importance of voluntarism here, but note at the same time that Americans whom I knew when I lived and worked in the USA often had a sense of moral duty to do things in and for their town which I have not found so evident in Australia. For Australians, too often, what is needed to be done should be fixed by 'they', or 'aorta' — meaning those responsible. (As in 'Aorta do something about those potholes.') The response I remember from the US was 'What are WE going to do about this?'

I agree completely Don.

I also noticed that there was a lot more 'charity' type support for their poor people, and that was because there was a lot less support and services from their government.

That being said, I was surprised they had nothing like our State Emergency Service volunteers. The Americans I knew thought that that would be a great idea. It would certainly explain why you generally wouldn't see a version of Brisbane's Mud Army for instance. For a start, many of them would think that they would get mugged or robbed if they allowed virtual strangers in to clean their houses.

However there were many more soup kitchens and free food giveaways, usually church run affairs, than I ever saw here. And that was in the good times, those churches must have been busy the last few years...

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David G,
Wow, you really shot me down with so much intellect ! No need to hurry but it would be great to get a sensible contradiction one day.

Neither this article nor the comments take account of differing approaches of the US and Australia. Philanthropy in the US arose out of low taxes and the view that Governments could or should not be responsible for reallocation of individuals - that there was an expectation that individuals would do a better job of direct intervention in problems. Australia on the other hand has a culture of expecting Government intervention - eg universal health, universal quality education, social welfare, and financial support to access university - and pays taxes accordingly.