Bleeding heart tightwads

Bleeding heart tightwads is the title of Nick Kristof's column today in the Times, which reports the fact that conservative people donate to charity at rates 30-50% higher than their more liberal brethren. This fact has been verified in several studies, both at the individual and state level. Red states are much more generous than blue states. Conservatives are also much more likely to volunteer their time than liberals. This phenomena also exists at a national level with U.S. citizens being more generous than more liberal-leading European nations by even bigger margins.

I have no idea what this means, but I find it really interesting.