2005 Volunteering in the United States — 2005-12-09

About 65.4 million people volunteered through or for an organization at least once between September 2004 and September 2005, the Bureau of Labor Statistics of the U.S. Department of Labor reported today. The proportion of the population who volunteered was 28.8 percent, the same as in each of the prior 2 years. These data on volunteering were collected through a supplement to the September 2005 Current Population Survey (CPS). Volunteers are defined as persons who did unpaid work (except for expenses) through or for an organization. The CPS is a monthly survey of about 60,000 households that obtains information on employment and unemployment among the nation's civilian noninstitutional population age 16 and over. For more information about the volunteer supplement, see the Technical Note. One-fourth of men and about one-third of women did volunteer work in the year ended in September 2005, about the same proportions as in the 2 prior years.