The rich dig deep

Everybody's in favor of eliminating all the "loopholes" in the tax code ... until you start naming them.

The home mortgage interest deduction? Maybe not right away.

Tax deductions for charitable giving? The write-off isn't the main reason Nevada's wealthiest citizens pull out their checkbooks, of course. But the amount those Nevadans contribute, digging deep even in these trying times, can be impressive.

Nevadans with a net worth of more than $1 million make up only 0.2 percent of the state's population, but account for more than 27 percent of its reported charitable contributions, according to a report Wednesday from The Private Bank by Nevada State Bank.

That adds up to hundreds of millions of dollars, donated to support health care, the arts and education.

The average annual giving from the state's richest families was $138,320. The average for all families is $957, according to the study conducted by Las Vegas-based Applied Analysis.

And Russell Price, executive vice president of The Private Bank, warned that the so-called "fiscal cliff" that is approaching on Monday could negatively impact charitable giving.

"We're keeping a particularly close eye on how Washington lawmakers deal with the fiscal cliff," Price said. "Limiting or even eliminating tax deductions could have significant impacts on households with high net worth, which contribute an average of nearly $140,000 each year to charities."

Price said these dollars fund some of Nevada's most crucial social services.

Higher education is the leading beneficiary of charitable donations in Nevada, as it is nationwide. From 2000 to 2010 higher education received 44.3 percent, or $1.5 billion, of all charitable donations in Nevada.

After higher education, Nevadans gave 13.3 percent, or $455.5 million, to causes focused on the arts, culture and the humanities; 10.2 percent, or $348.2 million, to human services; 7.3 percent, or $249.3 million, to health; and 25 percent, or $854.9 million to all other categories.

"The rich," as economist Thomas Sowell is often at pains to explain, are seldom born that way. Most work hard for decades to reach a point, near the end of their working lives, where for a few years they can give back this impressively.

Yet too many who lack their talent and work ethic would urge us to condemn the greed of those who "refuse to share."

The numbers tell a different story.