21–27 of 27 posts
This might be the dumbest shit I’ve ever read. It’s just one logical fallacy extended into 750 words. “Never do extremely good thing x because sometimes it causes bad thing y to happen”
The article argues that charity can be counterproductive, but we don't have to give to random charities where no one is paying attention to whether they're making things better. Instead of "never give money to charity" what about "always check charity reviews first"? As the article does eventually get to, the reviews on https://givewell.org can help you avoid the kind of disasters they open with.
In my experience, charity reviews are great for telling you if a charity is outright fraudulent, but not great at evaluating effectiveness. The best thing to do is either become involved with a local charity and evaluate for yourself, or do something like givedirectly and understand that occasionally the money will be poorly spent.
The main issue with local charity is that wealth is distributed very unequally around the world, so if everyone primarily helps those around them then the poorest people get the least help.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
at the end of the day, if the charity is actually receiving the money that the company claims they are giving, does it really matter the ultimate reason for the company's decision to give the money?
The individual loses the tax deductions themselves.
Has anyone else noticed the rise in retail companies asking "Would you like to round up for XYZ charity"? Am I pessimistic in thinking they're taking this money and donating it purely for free tax reduction?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
The individual loses the tax deductions themselves.
yeah, those "round up" donations are not going to qualify for much of a deduction, but the company collecting the round up from all of the donations will add up. if an individual wants to donate up to $0.99 (assuming rounding to whole dollar not nearest $5 or something) it's just chump change on an individual level. not really sure why you're so upset about this
This might be the dumbest shit I’ve ever read. It’s just one logical fallacy extended into 750 words. “Never do extremely good thing x because sometimes it causes bad thing y to happen”
I read more as: "Don't donate to groups....unless, they know what they're really doing..." ...which as a former employee of a non-profit, could not agree more.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
In my experience, charity reviews are great for telling you if a charity is outright fraudulent, but not great at evaluating effectiveness. The best thing to do is either become involved with a local charity and evaluate for yourself, or do something like givedirectly and understand that occasionally the money will be poorly spent.
Have you looked at GiveWell's reviews? They're really thorough and do try to evaluate effectiveness: https://www.givewell.org/charities/amf The main issue with local charity is that wealth is distributed very unequally around the world, so if everyone primarily helps those around them then the poorest people get the least help.
I’m a big believer in trust and feedback loops in charitable giving and the tough truth is that that’s really tough to maintain in global orgs with complicated missions. There are certain orgs that do a great job at this. Givedirectly (one of givewell’s recommended charities) actually does a great job at this, partially because their mission is pretty simple. I can look at their recipient stories page[2] and know for sure my money goes to exactly what I expect.
[0] - https://www.bbc.com/news/health-56670162
[1] - https://www.politico.com/news/2022/09/14/global-covid-pandem...
[2] - https://www.givedirectly.org/covid-19/us/recipient-stories/