Financial Responsibility of the Nation.
Foundations are organizations that aid research, cultural progress, and human welfare. Gifts of money from wealthy people and groups help establish and finance most foundations. .
Many foundations are called corporations, endowments, funds, or trusts. There are more than 24,000 foundations in the United States, not including privately endowed colleges, hospitals, and learned societies. These foundations have assets of about $68 billion. Americans give about $80 billion to charity every year. The foundations give about $4 1/2 billion, or about 6 percent of this amount. Much of it is given in the form of grants to organizations and individuals. Canada, the United Kingdom, and the nations of Western Europe have a much smaller number of foundations than the United States has. .
How foundations are organized .
A foundation can be organized as a trust or as a nonprofit corporation. It is easier to set up a trust than a nonprofit corporation, because there are fewer legal formalities. A nonprofit corporation can operate with greater freedom, however, because the law does not restrict its powers so narrowly. Both trusts and nonprofit foundations are governed by a trustee or trustees, or legally appointed administrators. The trustees may administer the foundation by themselves, or they may hire executives to manage the work of the foundation. .
Foundations are also organized according to the way they spend their funds. A perpetuity can spend only the income from its assets. For example, its assets may consist of stocks that pay regular dividends. A liquidating foundation must spend all its money within a specified period of time. An optional foundation can spend either its income or both the income and the assets. The Carnegie Corporation of New York is a perpetuity. The Julius Rosenwald Fund was self-liquidating. The Rockefeller Foundation is an optional foundation.