Data Point Has Implications for Volunteer Leadership
By Susan Sanow, CVA, Senior Manager, Volunteer Management Education, Volunteer Fairfax
The hourly rate for volunteering has been updated for 2026. While the national rate is $36.14, the rate for Virginia-based volunteers is $36.99. If you are seeking data for another state, it can be found here.
This data is a way to help quantify the value of volunteer work in a way that organizations, funders, and policymakers can understand. The data has been calculated and watched for decades. It can:
- Show economic impact – translating volunteer time into a dollar value, which helps demonstrate how much support volunteers contribute.
- Support grant applications and fundraising – show funders the value of volunteering contributions and justify funding needs.
- Help with reporting – include the value of volunteer hours in annual reports, budgets, and impact statements.
- Highlight community contribution – volunteer work has real value, even if no one is being paid.
- Assist in planning and strategic decision-making – the approximate value of donated time can help organizations compare volunteer support with staffing costs.
What the Data Does Not Do
There are negative implications of using hourly rates for volunteers:
- Could this undermine the spirit of volunteering? The spirit of volunteering could be replaced by a feeling of transaction and financial sacrifice. The dollar amount shows a value of the work – not to what the volunteer is getting from the experience.
- What is the true measure of a volunteer’s impact? Do we only value a by-the-hour measurement? If we always focus on the quantity of hours, it can reward time spent rather than outcomes achieved or effectiveness.
- Converting volunteer time into dollar amounts may distort the value of a program. It may make a program impact look larger financially, and not reflect the real social value created by volunteers.
- What if some volunteers feel uncomfortable having their volunteer service monetized, especially if they value volunteer time as a community contribution rather than labor.
- The volunteering hour rate is not always appropriate for either external or internal audiences. Externally, donors, boards, or partners may misunderstand hourly valuations and assume volunteers are interchangeable with paid staff. Internally, if any staff are paid UNDER this rate, it may be interpreted negatively and point at another example of being overworked and underpaid. Wouldn’t you?
Using volunteer hourly rates may raise legal and employment-related concerns as well as impact the recruitment and retention of volunteers. But used properly, an hourly rate for volunteering can be used as a data point to measure progress and communicate about volunteers.
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