Saskatchewan residents are the most generous Canadians, followed closely by their Western neighbours, according to a new study.

At the other end of the scale, Quebeckers and Newfoundlanders are the least philanthropic, according to the 1999 Private Charitable Generosity Index.

But, when compared to their neighbours to the south, Canadians are downright Scrooge-like, giving only a fraction of the amount to charity their U.S. counterparts do -- $743 on average versus $3,302 in the United States.

"Contrary to the widely held opinion that Canada is a far more giving society, the Canadian jurisdictions, in fact, are strikingly less generous than our U.S. counterparts," said Jason Clements, director of non-profit studies at the Vancouver-based Fraser Institute.

The generosity index measures three variables: the proportion of taxpayers who donate to registered charities, the percentage of after-tax income donated to charity, and the number of per-capita hours of volunteer time donated to charities.

Domestically, Manitoba leads the way in the donation category, with 31.6 per cent of taxpayers giving to charity. Newfoundland is last in this category, with 23.6 per cent.

Manitoba is again tops in percentage of income donated to charity, with 1.28 per cent. Quebec is last, with 0.59 per cent of private income going to charity.

Alberta is the leader in volunteering, with 12.1 hours annually. Prince Edward Island is last, with only 3.7 hours on average.

Saskatchewan does not lead in any one category, but has a strong enough showing in each area to come out on top over all.

Researchers also calculated the dollar value of donations but did not include it in the index because it favours wealthy provinces over poor ones. But those figures are fascinating, particularly when compared with U.S. statistics.

Alberta has the highest average donation, $965. (It also has the highest average income, $17,489.) But it still ranks far behind all 50 U.S. states. In Wyoming, the average donation is $6,927 annually, a whopping 40 per cent of the average income. (The figures were converted to Canadian dollars for the sake of easy comparison.) Even the least generous U.S. state, Rhode Island, had an average donation of $2,047. That is 5½ times the average donation in Quebec, $379.

When the Fraser Institute compared charitable giving in states and provinces, the best Canada could do was Manitoba's 20th-place ranking. (For this comparison, the institute used figures prepared by the Dallas-based National Center for Policy Analysis, which do not include volunteer hours. This is why Manitoba in this case, rather than Saskatchewan, appears as the highest-ranking province.)

"The 1999 private charitable generosity index represents an important step forward in quantifying private, individual generosity," the researchers write. But they say further work is required to examine the variables that may affect generosity, including tax rates, income levels, economic freedom and demographics. For example, the rankings are dominated by the Western "have" provinces, which seems to indicate a geographic influence and a relationship between available income and generosity.

The Fraser Institute, which created the generosity index, is an economic and social research organization with free-market leanings. It is a registered charity.

According to research published last year by Statistics Canada, more than 21 million Canadians -- 88 per cent of adults -- give money or goods to charity. Donations totalled $4.5-billion, or an average of $240 per person. More than 7.5-million Canadians, or one in three adults, volunteered with a charity last year. The economic value of that donated time was pegged at $16.3-billion. The average volunteer contributed 149 hours annually. In volunteering, as in giving, however, there are important regional variations. Quebeckers gave, on average, only $127 to charity, and 22 per cent of adults volunteered for charitable work. By contrast, the average gift to charity in Saskatchewan was $308, while 45 per cent of adults volunteered.

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