There are plenty of excellent reasons to find a good charity to support. Charitable giving is beneficial for your country and your community. Some people even say that charity is good for you health. Being generous with a portion of our own financial blessings is also a great American tradition.

Most of us already have specific charities which we like to support. For my household, we have given various gifts to The Arbor Day Foundation, our local volunteer fire fighters, local churches, and a smattering of other deserving causes. Most of our charitable gifts stay fairly close to home, but there are also many worthwhile national and international charities.

But how to decide which charity to support? How do you know a particular charity is trustworthy? Or responsible? Or actually helping the population you want to help? The answer to these questions are as close as your computer.

It's always nice to learn about good news in a bad economy.

SunTrust Bank Private Wealth Management just released a survey that looked at 202 high net worth business owners, whose companies have at least $10 million in annual revenue, to look at their charitable giving.

And probably the best news is that 70 percent of the CEOs said that even if the economic downturn moderately hurts their business, they plan to keep their current level of non-profit and charitable giving this year.

(Moderately is the key word, of course, leading one to believe that if a business is hurt dramatically, it's going to be every man, woman and child for themselves.)

Some other findings that may be interesting to people:

• Everyone was asked why they give money or time, and the top reason given was because donations "helps make a positive change." Much farther down the list were entrepreneurs who said they give to receive tax credits, to bring positive attention to their business, to network, to establish a legacy or gain recognition.

(That said, I've got to respect the entrepreneurs who were honest enough to admit--even anonymously--that their top reason for giving money was to receive tax credits, create a legacy or some other materialistic reason. On the other hand, so what, as long as CEOs with deep pockets are giving to charity.)

Given New York City's reputation for conspicuous consumption, I'm often surprised by the impressive level of philanthropy that the city has generated over the years. From Carnegie Hall to the Public Library system to the Maine Memorial, New York is covered with the impressive legacies of generous rich people. Of course, a disturbingly large number of these projects date from the nineteenth and early twentieth century, but I am still overwhelmed by the ways that the city's richest segment used to feel such an obligation to do its part for the rest of us slobs.

This is particularly striking when one considers our current crop of obscenely wealthy people. After all, while Tilden and Astor's New York Public Library was the result of a series of bequests, Donald Trump's much-touted restoration of the Grand Central Facade had to be tacked on as a precondition for one of his real-estate deals. The next generation is even worse: from where I stand, it seems like the only things that the Lizzie Grubmans and Paris Hiltons have to offer are DWIs, clandestine sex tapes, and the occasional hit-and-run. There was a time when public service was considered the duty of the wealthy. It was a sort of Calvinistic quid-pro-quo; while rich people enjoyed the benefits of incredible amounts of money, they showed their thanks with considerable generosity toward others. Nowadays, it seems like something that you do to get a tax break or score brownie points in court.

You'll probably be getting a lot of those annoying calls for donations during the month of December, especially at diner time. I know I get at least one or two almost every night at this time of year. I have a standard answer, "I never make a donation over the telephone." It's a good practice and will save you a lot of grief.

Many of these phone solicitors are scam artists. Some may actually use the credit card information to steal your identity - the worst of the bunch. Others are paid solicitors that give very little of the money they raise to the charities for which they call. In fact studies have shown that fundraisers for public safety groups are notorious for turning over as little as 20% or 30% of the money collected.

If the organization that calls you is one that interests you, take down the information and research the group yourself. Check out the group's website, but also check out the American Institute of Philanthropy's grading system. If the organization doesn't get an A or a B, look for something else to give your hard-earned money to.

The only exception to these phone call rules is if you know the caller and the organization. If you're already involved with the organization and you know their fund raising activities are legit, go ahead and make the donation if you want.

Let's see a show of hands, who has their 501(c)(3) corporations all picked out for tax time?

It's not that I advocate using the act of charity to manipulate your tax burden, but you must admit that when it comes to paying taxes, if a donation of a couple hundred dollars will drop you into a lower tax bracket at filing time, a check to Habitat for Humanity suddenly becomes much more palatable.

The designation of 501(c)(3) is the code which identifies IRS registered, non-profit organizations. That's the first thing you want to look for when considering a charitable donation. There are (and should be) a host of other questions that you need to ask when donating, but where are the answers?

While investigating the Kiplinger.com web site, I discovered an absolutely excellent source of charitable organization analysis tucked in with Kiplinger's 25 Best Web Sites review. Charity Navigator.org is a website dedicated to the nuts-and-bolts financial disclosure of non-profit corporations large and small. Charity Navigator reveals how charities are handling the donations they receive and gives a broad view about how a charity is performing on the books. With a free and easy registration to the site, you can also have access to deeper analysis on specific organizations, such as a retrospective analysis of an organization's historical performance.

The experts say that when considering non-profit organizations to make donations to, you should always be careful and do your homework. Try to make sure that the organizations you choose to support serve your principles and ideals. You might find value by spending a little time at Charity Navigator to compare how charities stack up in their performance and while you're there, be sure to read their Top 10 Practices of Savvy Donors.