Paying the Cost of Volunteering

I have been mulling over my post from yesterday. Today, I am trying to look at the implications financially and practically of demographic change in volunteering.

At a presentation I did for my local area on Tuesday, I calculated that to pay for the equivalent of what volunteers do in my local area would be 90 million dollars per annum. The Total revenue from rates (land taxes) for 2010-11 for my shire was expected to raise 104 million dollars. In other words, if we had to replace all of the volunteer efforts with paid staff, our land taxes would need to almost double to pay for it.

It is very unlikely, that we would lose 100 per cent of our volunteering but demographic shifts suggest to me that we may see significant losses in some key areas. Older volunteers contribute a very high number of hours of service. As older volunteers diengage from volunteering, for health reasons, we will need to replace those people somehow. I do not see them being replaced by Baby Boomers or Gen X. Lets say, as a result of demographic shifts, we lose 20 per cent of our overall volunteer hours. To replace these hours with paid staff would requires the community to find funding of 18 million dollars.

There are six ways the community could manage this:


1. Some services could close


We are seeing that possibility with Rotary Clubs, Country Womens Associations and Citizen Advice Bureaus which are predominately staffed by older volunteers. It would mean we lose tree planting, advocacy for the disadvantaged, the building of park equipment or equipment purchasing for local Hospitals. Whatever the cuts, key infrastructure would be missing. The difficulty is that with an aging population we are going to need more of some services.

2. We could charge people fees or greater fees for community services

To engage paid staff in some roles currently done by volunteers will cost. So for example the cost of getting a Meal through Meals on Wheels would rise, the cost of admission to museums, people would pay more to park at the beach, or pay a higher fire levy.

3. Charities could fundraise more

Again, to pay for labour to replace volunteer input would require money. So we as citizens would need to donate more. Lets say every citizen man, woman and child in my area (150 000 people) gave $120 per year more- ten dollars per month. This is money not for new services or to help more people but simply to preserve what we already have that is being provided by volunteers. This would raise the eighteen million dollars.

4. We could restructure how we engage volunteers 

We know that we will have lots of very skilled Baby Boomers in the community. They may not want to work behind the counter of a Charity shop every week for the next year. They may however be interested in a program that gives them four weeks behind the counter, four weeks working in the office and four weeks distributing the aid raised by the shop. Then starting the cycle again. Or we may get a group of ex marketing managers together and have them develop the marketing campaign for the charity currently done  by a paid person. Those funds could be then released to employ people to do the more "basic work" which may not be as appealing to tomorrow's volunteers.


5. Get more people to volunteer for a day


There are many organisations encouraging one day of service.  For example working on meals on wheels once a year or planting trees once in a year or serving in a charity shop once in a year. Yes, there are some training and safety issues we need to consider when we do this. To replace 18 million dollars worth of volunteer labour, would require 100 000 people to give one day per year. In other words, almost every resident of my area would need to give that day.




6. Try and Engage New Volunteers


We could develop creative ways to engage some of the the 60 per cent of people who do not volunteer at all.

7. Put our Taxes up

To use our taxes to pay for the volunteers who would not be able to any more, would require a 17.3 per cent increase. My land tax would go up by about  by around $136 per annum. This rise would not be for new services but simply to fund the gap caused by a loss of volunteer power in key roles during key hours.

Clearly to cope with the changing demographic we could do a combination of things.
The actual mix of options chosen will impact things, If we decide not to replace volunteers with paid staff funded by tax or fund-raising, we will lose more services. No new playgrounds or hospital equipment would have a negative impact on our community.

If we decide we cannot lose any services, then we may have to fund more through taxes. 

If we put energy into options 4 and 5 (which would require an investment in people to do volunteer engagement - lets say $250 000 per annum for this), we may find we don't need to lose any services and only need to raise taxes by .2% (to pay for good volunteer engagement). 

Whatever we decide to do, we need to start to make changes now.