Donation Nation

Americans are a generous people and they continue to give even when their money ends up in the wrong hands.

If you’ve got kids in your house, you’ve probably already seen the list.

The gift list. What your kids want for Christmas.

And you’ve told them something about the value of the gift being inversely proportional or directly proportional to whether they’ve been naughty or nice, respectively.

And you’re working on your own budget for Christmas shopping.

But here’s the truth. You’ve already given a lot of money this year and collectively, as Americans, the figures are almost beyond belief.

Billions. For most of us, a billion has way too many zeros to the right of the first number to be comprehensible in any way that directly touches our own lives.

Seeing a billion written out in numbers alerts us to one simple fact: That’s a whole lot of money! But as far as getting our mind around how much it actually is ... well, it might as well be a jillion or a zillion or a bazillion or some other indeterminately large and meaningless number.

But, of...