In an attempt to understand what types of incentives might motivate people to get more engaged in their communities, NCoC asked people to rate nine incentives on the likelihood they would get them more engaged.

Overall, the most popular incentives were giving tax breaks and paid time-off for volunteering, at 24% each, followed by educational vouchers at 22%. Although these incentives were generally popular for all age groups, each generation had different rankings, reflecting changing priorities and motivation at different stages of life.

Generally speaking, younger generations were far more likely to respond to various incentives positively than older generations. Age 65+ were particularly reluctant to say that these incentives would motivate them. For example, only 10% of age 65+ said that tax breaks would motivate them to engage more, compared to 24% support overall. Instead, incentives like property tax break and free public transportation were relatively more attractive to age 65+.

We also explored responses from specific groups of respondents to understand what might motivate people who are generally less engaged. Among non-volunteers, paid time-off won approval from 19% of respondents, followed by educational vouchers (18%) and tax incentives (17.5%). The people who had cut down on civic engagement were generally less likely to respond positively to incentives. However, they were just as likely to say that paid-time off for volunteering would motivate them. Among the people whose household incomes were less than $50,000, free public transportation was particularly popular (20%, compared to 13% among higher income respondents), in addition to tax incentives (30%) and paid time-off (27%). Although providing childcare was overall the least popular incentive, it was relatively better received among respondents who had a minor child living with them (16% compared to 7% of people without a minor child). Overall, it appears that some Americans are looking for ways to make volunteering and engagement a more integrated and relatively low-cost part of their lives. That is, when people are already short on resources, they are not likely to become more engaged unless there is concrete (and often financial) support for volunteering and engagement. As noted above, only 14% of those surveyed said they wished they could do more but lack opportunities. But opportunities are different from incentives such as tax breaks or paid time-off. Incentives seem to have some potential for raising engagement.