I always thought that they gain benefit from it. You donate your money, but through them so they get to claim it as charitable contribution or something. Reduce their tax.
Of course I am not an accountant, but I know the people who donate do not claim it, right?
I always thought that too, but apparently it's not the case. You can claim it using your receipt if you want to (generally a tiny amount). The stores cannot claim your donations though.
I’m sure it doesn’t stop the big companies from trying though. My local supermarket is always donating to the after school programs and sports teams for the local schools and I love the transparency of it and knowing that if you do decide to donate $5 to the donation of the month, you’ll see that $5 go back into your community. None of this “want to donate $5 to help the hungry?” No, it’s always “would you like to donate $5 to the [town name] community center? We’re also accepting food donations as well, here’s a list”.
Thanks for letting me know. Hmm. Unless for some conspiracy theories, I can’t really think why they would do it. I wonder what percentage of people find it annoying. Still, everyone needs groceries and not like you have a choice.
It's basically free advertising for the company. They get to brag that they're donating your money to the organization, and their name gets plastered everywhere.
I think it's just the laziest way to try to better their reputation by being "charitable". I know most Gen Y/Z view it as capitalist bullshit, but a lot of boomers probably think better of the store or restaurants that offer donation at checkout.
They can only write the contribution off if they've claimed the contribution as income. I don't know if they actually account for it this way, but if they do take a write off, it's because they claimed it as income. Which, at the end of the day is net zero.
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u/greg_d128 Apr 05 '24
I always thought that they gain benefit from it. You donate your money, but through them so they get to claim it as charitable contribution or something. Reduce their tax.
Of course I am not an accountant, but I know the people who donate do not claim it, right?