It is an acknowledged truth that most of my fellow Americans are the most giving people on Earth. This wonderful melting pot of countless nationalities and faiths gives more to charity than most of the other countries in the free world. However, I have discovered that in the pot, one group of Americans gives about 1.3 percent of their income to charity while another gives 3.2 to 7.6 percent. If I told you one group comprised the average wage earner and the poor and the other the rich, which group would you believe gives the higher percentage?

Despite all the charitable names on buildings on behalf of the modern American aristocracy, the wealthy aren't nearly as generous to charities as the average American and the impoverished. The wealthiest Americans, those with earnings in the top 20 percent, give on average a less significant proportion of their income to charity than those on the other side of the coin, with earnings in the bottom 20 percent.

Given that I have friends on both sides, I believe that neither is particularly more generous than the other. I have discovered that how much we donate and to whom has a great deal to do with our ZIP codes and circles of influence. For example my wealthiest friends prefer to emulate social contemporaries by channeling their non-political charitable donations to colleges and universities, arts organizations and museums. Most of my peers tend to give to religious, social service and educational charities and to disaster relief. I'm not sure what floats our philanthropic boats but researchers at the University of Indiana have noted that increased exposure to poverty and the consistent grind to subsist creates higher empathy among lower-income donors. As well, the research cited: "The rich are more likely to prioritize their own interests above the interests of other people."

I don't completely agree with the "self-interest" premise. I believe the simple answer is that each wonderfully giving group goes with what it knows. The wealthy donors prudently review the beneficiary's spread sheets and take advantage of the tax benefits whereas the average and lower income contributors innocuously follow their hearts and usually do not take the tax exemptions. The sad reality is that neither group really knows the other. This I believe could be a far more telling, if not troubling, economic and social indicator.

Meanwhile, as our nation seeks to recover from the worst economic slide since the Great Depression, I believe time is of the essence for our wealthiest citizens to accept the challenge to match the 3.2 to 7.6 percent donation level many of their fellow Americans are contributing. The Forbes list of the top 500 American Company CEO salaries for 2012 totaled over $5.4 billion and that doesn't include the stock option/ownership perks totaling over $869.7 billion.

Add the thousands of subordinate executive compensation packages to the mix and you have more wealth than the entire fiscal resources of many countries of the world. If just half of these chiefs contributed the 7.6 percent we would be a much healthier nation, especially if the donations were given to the many productive and prudent community-based charities like the Idaho Community Foundation and chambers of commerce. As our small businesses are the backbone of our economy, so too our local communities and neighborhoods are the roots of this beautiful tree we call America.

I am not asserting that the national charitable organizations are not doing their jobs but then again many of them have been dancing in the fundraising arena for several decades and we still have the societal plights and diseases they were righteously established to cure. And you can bet your hiking boots that the combined annual salaries of the CEOs and executive directors of the top local community-based aid organizations are a minuscule fraction of the CEO compensation packages of the top 20 national non-profit charitable foundations which total well over $26.2 million.

As well, in light of the recent IRS, media rights infringement, Benghazi, NSA surveillance and State Department cover-up scandals, Americans are losing even more faith in their political leaders and many are tightening their charitable purse strings. Therefore, local, state and the federal governments should be diligently thinking hard about how to encourage more giving. A study by the University of Michigan found that state tax credits for charitable donations stimulate greater contributions than they cost the states in the form of lost revenue. At least 13 states now offer special tax benefits to charitable donors and more are slated to follow suit. While not every contributor may admit it, it's not just the tug at our heart-strings that encourages giving but for many, the pull of the taxman.

The need for individual giving is greater than it has ever been in our history. As I sit here on the back porch savoring my morning coffee watching the old one-eyed deaf pound mutt playing in the first light, I pray that the rich remember the eye of the needle, those who give ... keep on giving, and the many who have not yet experienced the fulfillment of giving, do so soon.

Julius Pekar is a resident of Hayden Lake.