Learning Tzedakah from the Poor

Who gives more to tzedakah, the poor, the middle-class or the wealthy? The answer is the poor. Taken as a percentage of their overall income, the poor give the most. Interesting, no? People who don’t have money still don’t have a hard time giving away some of what they do have. Perhaps it is because they have the greatest empathy for those in need. Maybe it’s because they are less likely to have credit cards. Many people I know tell me that between the credit card bills, the tuition, the taxes, the mortgage and the car payments, they don’t have anything left to give. Judaism, of course, believes that we should give our tzedakah “off the top” not from that which is left. Perhaps we can learn something from the charitable poor.

Among the poor, statistics show that certain types of poor Americans are more likely to give. A person who lives below the poverty line, but is not on government assistance, belongs to a House of Worship and is married is in fact seven more times as likely to give to tzedakah as a person who is on government assistance for food and housing, does not belong to a shul or church, and is a single parent – even if they have the exact same income per year!

It seems to me that these stats indicate that these people who give tzedakah see it as part of their social responsibility. People who stand proudly on their own two feet and who join in community (both spiritually and in terms of family) have a greater sense of connectedness with the world around them. Their tzedakah is a proud statement of who they are and what they stand for, not a “luxury tax” donated because they feel that they have been blessed. They do not give because they have “a little extra”. They give because they feel a sense of responsibility. We all have a lot to learn from those who seem to have the least. At the end of the day they have a lot more than most people think.