In my case, this year I contributed slightly more than 1% of my before-tax income to non-profit and charity goals, and I hope one day I can afford 10% or more.

Here’s how it broke down:

-Local National Public Radio stations
-Christmas presents and clothing for children of an at-risk family that we know
-a local open-space preservation society that helps conserve the watershed, open space, and farmland in my region (vital in an urban/suburban area like mine)
-a local art organization that develops large scale art installations focussed on healing and community. It also works with hundreds of local at-risk youth and channels their energy and angst to productive artistic efforts (including the large-scale art installations described earlier). I also give one to three eight hour days to this organization, to help build one of the art installations that commemorates World Aids day and offers the community a place to contemplate the disease and its effects.
-Christmas presents for family, which were gift contributions to a children’s charity in Puerta Viarta, and to Heifer International (rather than consumables that no one really needed or wanted).

[...] Charity Navigator: Your Guide to Intelligent Giving This is an extremely useful resource. My only complaint is that when you start digging into smaller charities, the coverage is somewhat spotty, but if you want to know more about a “big” charity from an impartial source, this is the way to go. (@ get rich slowly) [...]

[...] Get Rich Slowly discusses Charity Navigator as a guide to intelligent giving. [...]

Here’s a short quote, with supporting scriptures. Pay close attention to the very first sentence.

“At no time were first-century Christians commanded to pay tithes. The primary purpose of the tithing arrangement under the Law had been to support Israel’s temple and priesthood; consequently the obligation to pay tithes would cease when that Mosaic Law covenant came to an end as fulfilled, through Christ’s death on the torture stake. (Eph 2:15; Col 2:13, 14) It is true that Levitical priests continued serving at the temple in Jerusalem until it was destroyed in 70 C.E., but Christians from and after 33 C.E. became part of a new spiritual priesthood that was not supported by tithes.—Ro 6:14; Heb 7:12; 1Pe 2:9.”
– “Insight on the Scriptures”, vol. 2, WTBTS

I do give, fairly heavily, of my time and, as I am able, of my money. But I haven’t tithed in years and have no intention of beginning now.

Coming back to the topic; I am one of Jehovah’s Witnesses. We have a very active disaster relief program you might be interested in because of its high ‘bang for the buck’ ratio. http://www.thegaryhalbertletter.com/newsletters/2005/09-02-05.htm

To the best of my knowledge, Gary is not one of Jehovah’s Witnesses and does not mention any intention of ever becoming one, so his observations should carry a bit more weight than mine.

There are a lot of ‘anti-JW’ sites out there. Gary ‘did the research’ and came to a different conclusion.

I am not shilling for donations … we tend to be internally self-supporting … but if you are looking for a lot of bang from your charitable buck, this destination is worth considering.

I did notice a web-site titled jw-relief.org.

Be careful. I am fairly certain that it is NOT AFFILIATED with Jehovah’s Witnesses. Compare a whois search (www.pir.org) for “jw-media.org” with one for jw-relief.org to see the difference in registrations.

Great comments by Jeff. I can really relate, I run a very small charity and we truly struggle for general funding to keep our staff in Africa paid. Without the staff, the programs cannot happen, but people really like to feel that their money is “purchasing” an “object” that is more concrete. Hence the “donation catalog” approach – but basically you have to build in all your staffing costs and other general costs into the cost of each item to make this workable due to the reasons Jeff cited.

If anyone is interested, my organization is Uganda Village Project http://www.ugandavillageproject.org – we spend 100 cents of every dollar on programs and zero cents on fundraising! (hope it is not illegal to tell you that about myself)

I struggle with my wish to do more, and to reconcile my experience with my husband’s. As a work-outside-the-home parent of two small children, I don’t have the time to volunteer much now. And my husband came from a different culture where charity starts and ends at home. He does not wish to donate to charity until his brothers earn as much as he does. (Which will never happen, the pay scales are so much lower where they live.)

I have finally reconciled this for myself by donating a portion of MY salary to charities that mean a lot to me. I try to donate a fixed amount to my charities of choice (those which are run well, have a signifcant impact on issues that are important to me: public health in developing nations, education, and women’s ability to control their own bodies). I budget smaller amounts for solicitations from friends and for “emergencies” like the tsunami 3 years ago. As my children grow older I hope to have the time to volunteer and encourage them to do the same.

My charities are all about the world that I want to live in, a civilised place where no one is tortured, no one dies needlessly of hunger, Aids is not the worlds biggest epidemic and people aren’t homeless.

This means that I give to Amnesty International, Oxfam and Shelter. These charities are all respected in their fields, I know that they spend money on campaigning and I’m happy with that. They also don’t support positions that I find morally questionable.

As Pippin wrote above, I try not to undermine my charitable contributions with my purchases. To this end, I’ve made a commitment not to purchase un-fairly traded chocolate.

I’m also a foster dog parent, so that’s where my time comes in, and it’s great having a buddy follow me around when I’m at home watching tv or cleaning the bathroom or waiting for me to come home.

Humans and structures aren’t the only things that need help.

Also..it’s interesting that charitable giving comes up so frequently at the end of the year. If you give throughout the year, it doesn’t make such a huge dent in your funds. Ps-again, love the edit feature.

That said, there are any number of accounting and other management issues that can give a good organization a bad recommendation/score with a rating system like the one used by Charity Navagator. For example, mega-issues like the relationship between and weighing of “organizational efficieny” factors (e.g. how much is spent on things like management and fundraising) and “organizational capacity” (including working capital ratios); on the one hand we want the charities we support to spend-out the money we give them on programs, but on the other hand we’re concerned if they don’t have an adequate emergency fund in the bank. And then there are various accounting issues, including some relative new accounting regulations in the nonprofit sector (e.g. how to reflect multi-year gift commitments in the current accounting period), that can dramatically skew the picture in a given year and give donors the impression that the charity is not being managed efficiently and/or doesn’t need your support. And, God forbid, that our donation be used to support “overhead”! (But what organization can survive, let alone thrive, without a strong management capacity?)

I’ve come to believe that most Americans, while well intentioned, are a little niave about what it takes for a charitable organization to actually be effective in it’s mission, not just tug at our heart strings – which are two very different things. So, by all means, use Charity Navagator as a first blush, but really do your homework – and get persoannly involved in an organization – before you accept something like the CN rating system as sacrosanct.

-Jeff Yeager
The Ultimate Cheapskate

I don’t have a tremendous amount of expendable income right now so I have decided to give back in a different way. Every Friday on my site I run a series called, ‘Humanitarian Friday’ where I highlight one humanitarian issue and the organizations that are trying to assist.

If anyone has a cause that they would like to see get some more exposure they can visit my site: http://www.mytropicalescape.com or email me direct at mark_w_hayward[at]yahoo[dot]com.

My most recent ‘Humanitarian Friday’ post was suggested by Skellie, and it discusses Amnesty International’s “Stop Violence Against Women” campaign.

I would like to see more bloggers get involved in writing about humanitarian/social causes and the organizations that are working hard everyday.

Happy New Year,
Mark

We like to try to donate some “sweat equity” durring th year as well as cash. Helping to fix houses or work with abused families have been some of the best experiences of our lives.

Regardless, I encourage anyone to give in whatever way works best for them.

But the impetus for me giving locally is the money stays and helps in my city. I may benefit directly (some of my money may be used to buy a book I’d been wanting to read) or indirectly (helping children and adults in my city to become better educated).

I also give to other local organizations dealing with eduction and projects I hold dear to my heart (Golden Retriever Rescue), but they are almost exclusively local.

I’ve also noticed as I’ve become more financially stable I’ve begun to give more money away (not more than I can afford, just more). I still probably don’t give 10% though, but I give what I am comfortable with. It should be noted that Dave Ramsey believes in tithing 10%. Tithing by definition is giving to the church, not charity. I don’t agree with this, but that’s the great thing about giving, it’s personal, and we can all give to what we want to whom we want. Happy Giving!

Since it was Christmas time, my contribution went to a homeless shelter. Charity Navigator gave the organization 4 stars which helped me greatly in the selection.

My wife donates frequently to war veterans charity organizations which I, of course, support as well. I am amazed how many veterans are actually homeless.

I wonder about the 10% rule (is it gross, net per household or per person, etc.) and I wonder what % of people actually give that much. In 2007 I gave about $2000 in donations (I have not yet crunched the final numbers) as we cut back on our giving during our debt paydown project (just as we cut back in other areas).

I also wonder whether it makes sense for people who are deep in debt to continue to tithe 10% when they are underwater. Dave Ramsey teaches that you give 10% no matter what. I don’t agree.

Unfortunately, to the best of my knowledge there is not common Do Not Solicit list for mailings unlike there is for phone calls.

The worst news for you is that if you are a magazine subscriber you will continue to get charity mail since that is the primary source of new names for most charities. Very few trade their names with others, and if they do it is usually only the donors who give at the lowest levels or very infrequently. No charity wants to give others access to their best donors.

My advice is that if you get a letter from a charity that you would never wish to support, make use of the envelope and coupon they give you, write in large letters across the coupon “Please do not solicit me any more”, most reputable charities will respect this.

Having worked in the philanthropic field for over 5 years I can tell you that each charity is unique in the way that it raises money. There are a wide variety of techniques out there for raising money such as: telemarketing, direct mail, events, large donations, bequests, etc. Each technique has it’s pluses and minuses.

For example, events often require large volumes of staff & volunteer time which is often difficult to get (volunteerism in our country is currently at an all time low), and the total dollars raised unless you are a very large charity can be very small. Direct mail on the other hand has relatively low staff requirements, freeing that resource to do other things but does have a higher cost as the labor is essentially outsourced to a vendor.

Before you write off a charity based solely on the evaluation of their tax filings you may want to have a conversation with them to better understand how they raise their funds. You may find that the Oregon Historical Society is not such a bad charity to support after all.

Cheaper is not necessarily better if efficiency and long-term viability suffer as a result.

I was raised in a family which gave both of itself and of its chequebook, but I’ve rethought my methodology on identifying causes- I refuse to respond to advertising or emergency funds, as they usually don’t have the infrastructure to spend resources effectively (including at the wrong end of the problem!). Instead, I’ve mapped out the type of world I’d want, and act accordingly, including donating to a set of charities, but also ensuring moral consistency by not buying products which undermine my ‘social’ goals.