From foster grandparents who volunteer at an early child care center to citizen scientists who collect water quality data in remote locations, nonprofit volunteers have come back after the pandemic.
A new survey released Tuesday from the U.S. Census Bureau and AmeriCorps shows 28.3% or 75.8 million people in the U.S. volunteered with a nonprofit between Sept. 2022 and Sept. 2023. That is a rebound since COVID-19 public health shutdowns tanked participation to 23.2% in 2021, the last time the survey was conducted. It is not a full return to prepandemic rates of volunteerism.
The drop in volunteer participation was a wake up call for nonprofits, says AmeriCorps CEO Michael D. Smith, and a real test of whether volunteers, whose habits and routines were disrupted, would return.
The survey on volunteering and civic life, conducted every two years, asks respondents if they volunteered at a nonprofit. It also asks if they informally helped friends, family or neighbors or gave to charity.
The free labor volunteers provide to nonprofits fuels a huge range of services across every kind of community in the U.S., with the survey estimating the value of a volunteer hour at $33.49, far more than the minimum wage in any state or major U.S. city.
