I enjoyed a good Sunday at my local Baptist church and it struck me that I donate very little money. This is something I’d like to change. I’ve been very blessed in my life with what I’ve grown up to be and now it’s time to pay some respect, pay it forward, and give a little help to the little guy.
Who hear donates money? How do you run diligence on the organizations and nonprofits you contribute to?
Overall it’s about time I give some back to make the world a better place.
I donate money, every two weeks. Then the US Treasury distributes it as it sees fit, which doesn’t really jive with how I’d dole it out, but hey they didn’t ask my input.
But in all seriousness I don’t really donate money. If I’m going to do something worthwhile I’ll donate my time and spend a Saturday or something giving back. I volunteered hundreds of hours back in high school and college at hospitals, Habitat for Humanity, stuff like that. I enjoy it more than just charging $50 to my credit card and trying to remember to deduct it at tax time. My office also gives us 8 hrs of PTO specifically for volunteering and organizes 3-4 events a year, usually on a Friday afternoon. This year we’ve gone to the local food bank and helped with a park restoration and tree planting.
We donate to local charities – homeless shelters, food banks, and so on – so it’s relatively easy to see where the money goes.
I’ve done a number of shows at fundraisers for local charities as well.
^ Agree, I dig the gratitude you’re expressing, but how do you run diligence on the charities? I want to ensure the utility of my money is used well.
one thing I know is to find out what the expense ratio is. This tells you how much of your donation is actually helping people in need instead of paying the pockets and expenses of the executives running the charity.
Most these wack “charities” spend more money on running their “business” than helping the benficiaries. I believe many of them will disclose what % makes it to the benficary if you ask.
I actually do donate, but I don’t have any tax deductions and because my donations dont exceed the standard dectuctable I dont think I get any tax benefit from them… so wack.
I am part of The Giving Pledge. Once I make a few billions, that’s where my $$$ is going.
I am part of The Giving Pledge. Once I make a few billions, that’s where my $$$ is going.
I think you should donate time if you want to give back. I did mentoring of a kid last year. Trying to get more into youth counseling. I’m sure some of the kids up in Harlem could use a guy from their neighborhood showing them what possibilities exist. That would probably help more than any money (unless it was bonker bunks).
^ I do mentor and donate plenty of my time. I help in food shevles, I’ve served in soup kitchens, and last year even coached a kid through his last year of high school after his father was murdered. All of that is well and good and I enjoy it. However, I’ve been pretty fortunate and blessed financially. I really should be donating money to provide a greater good than I can do with my time alone.
This is a pretty good site to see which charities actually spend the money on what they say they spend it on.
^ Respect.
Yo!! The charity of rawraw is accepting donations. I’ll provide you monthly disclosures on the return on donation I’ve achieved with your blessed gift 
Don’t go too overboard on the expense ratio issue. I know someone who sells stuff saying the proftis go to charity, and he’s chosen a charity where 100% of the money goes to what they say it is (in this case, clean drinking water to poor communities in developing countries).
It sounds great, but the issue is that organizations like that need to have qualified people running the place. To expect capable people to do quality work (comparable to what you’d expect from a private sector contractor) for free just isn’t realistic.
So again, it’s a case of extremes. You don’t want to give money to a nonprofit where the president or CEO is raking in millions (unless it’s a globally distributed nonprofit similar in scope to a major corporation), but you also don’t want the place run by amateurs, because badly done projects are incredibly wasteful as well, even if - technically - you can say that none of the people actually working on the project were paid anything. A water source that breaks down after a few weeks because it was built by some charitable hobbyists working for free is far less useful than a robust well built by paid professionals who know what they’re, know what can go wrong, and can be held accountable for what they do.
Different nonprofits have different human resource needs. Some just need hands and labor, others need managerial talent, others need people with connections to key officials, etc… A certain amount of talent can be done by volunteers or people paid a token amount, but some things are full-time jobs for real people who need to be able to feed their families too.
I donate money to certain institutions, including past schools I have attended as well as various charitable foundations that align with my interest. In these cases, there is already a layer of competent people that I think are running the organization effectively.
However, I think my greatest offering is in advisory or board roles with various organizations. In these cases I feel that my dedication of time and energy is worth more than my money, not to mention that sometimes I’m reticent about simply doling out cash if I don’t think the organization is being run as optimally as it could be.
There’s a place out here in West Texas that gives jobs to socioeconomically disadvantaged women. Some of them come from troubled backgrounds, like drug abuse or domestic violence. Many of them are single mothers who need income to be able to provide for their kids. A few of them have even been able to use the money from the job to go to college and earn their degree, if I’m not mistaken.
I think this company has locations all over the US. Check the list and see if there are any locations near you, and you can help donate to the cause.
\End Thread.
See my Strip Club post though to see my POV on gentlemen clubs. And if I’m not mistanken, RICKS is not a 501C. Could I still qualify my ‘contributions’ to this establishment on my Schedule A? Please advise Sir Greenie, CPA.
Respect
I spent all my free time chasing HCBs.
my company has a whole department thats in charge of volunteering and donations. they have a list of charities they approve which have been reserached pretty extensively, they also match my donations.
outside of work i donate to my alma matter, they helped me a lot financially when i was in undergrad
For as much sh*t as the media talks, us BSD’s sure are some charitable mofo’s…