In Bowling Alone Robert Putnam argues that the passing of the "long civic generation," whose values were moldedby the Depression and the Second World War, has resulted in a decline in civicengagement. In this analysis we test the generation hypothesis by comparing the volunteer behavior of two successive generations of women at the same age. No supportfor Putnam's thesis isfound. Once appropriate controls for sociodemographic trendsare imposed, generation differences disappear. However, thereare cohortdifferences in the type ofvolunteerwork performed.Each year, volunteer workers contribute billions of dollars in value to the u.s. economy (Boris 1999). Even so, there are rarely enough volunteers to meet the demand, as a glance at any local newspaper will reveal. In light of this shortage of volunteers, any social change that discourages volunteering is worrisome. Two recent changes suggest that balancing supply and demand in the market for volunteers will become more difficult in the future. The first is the Reagan administration's cut in government spending initiated in the 1980s.A deliberate policy of shifting social welfare from public to private agencies meant that nonprofit agencies were expected to assume an even greater burden in the provision of human services. Alongside increasing demand, the supply of volunteers is threatened. Americans simply have less free time today. But lack of time is not the primary reason that a decline in volunteering is expected. In a recent publication, Putnam (2000) has suggested that younger generations
