{"items": [{"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150100397376213", "anchor": "fb-10150100397376213", "service": "fb", "text": "@Herbert: I don't know your particular situation right now, but the standard approach to having time but not money is to get a job or work more at an existing job.", "timestamp": "1299857123"}, {"author": "Ted", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150100397966213", "anchor": "fb-10150100397966213", "service": "fb", "text": "I like the latter.", "timestamp": "1299857172"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150100402506213", "anchor": "fb-10150100402506213", "service": "fb", "text": "@Herbert: I'm sorry I misinterpreted your question. I think the answer is about the same. Most people who have time could be using that time to earn money.", "timestamp": "1299857634"}, {"author": "Laura", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150100426526213", "anchor": "fb-10150100426526213", "service": "fb", "text": "Work is often stressful--even though it's more efficient, it's hard to imagine convincing people to work more in order to donate money instead of volunteering, which gets them out of their heads, interacting with people, and feeling like they're making a concrete difference. People are people, not machines.
Not to mention that many people, no matter how much they work, are not going to make a lot of money. And not everyone who wants to work can find a job! It's an unfortunate reality of our economy. And then there are students, who may have the energy to volunteer precisely because it is fulfilling, but not to work at a boring or stressful job on top of their studies.", "timestamp": "1299859663"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150100437351213", "anchor": "fb-10150100437351213", "service": "fb", "text": "\"Work is often stressful--even though it's more efficient, it's hard to imagine convincing people to work more in order to donate money instead of volunteering, which gets them out of their heads, interacting with people, and feeling like they're making a concrete difference. People are people, not machines.\"
Working part time at a side job that makes some money while being less stressful might make sense. Really it comes down to whether you're charity work is about making other people happier or making yourself happier. I do other things (contra dancing!) to be happy.
\"many people, no matter how much they work, are not going to make a lot of money.\"
You don't have to make a lot of money to make a lot of difference. What money you can give can go quite a long way overseas.
\"not everyone who wants to work can find a job\"
Right. Looking for a job is a lot of work, but you can't really spend full working days looking for a job for weeks on end. There's a lot of waiting. My guess is that the time you can't spend looking for a job is better spent on education (possibly at the library) to become more marketable. Speaking of which, if you know anyone who wants to learn programming so that they can get a job and be able to give more money away, I'm happy to teach.
\"there are students, who may have the energy to volunteer precisely because it is fulfilling, but not to work at a boring or stressful job on top of their studies\"
As long as you're volunteering to make yourself happier, this makes a lot of sense. It's not a good strategy towards maximizing the good you can do in the world. More studying, or getting a job/internship in the field you want to work in post graduation probably makes more sense.", "timestamp": "1299860585"}, {"author": "Sophia", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150100437396213", "anchor": "fb-10150100437396213", "service": "fb", "text": "Very interesting, I do appreciate this analysis (especially so because I am an econ major!). I would like to add though, that there are positive externalities to the community as a whole when people give their time to help others. When people work in their communities, they connect with people they might not otherwise interact with and they gain skills that they might not doing only what they're currently good at - as a result we gain a society that is more compassionate and understanding of social problems than if people only did what they are good at and left \"service\" to the professionals. Thanks for the thoughts, this is something I spend a large portion of my time thinking about and love to engage others in it too!", "timestamp": "1299860591"}, {"author": "Amelia", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150100443851213", "anchor": "fb-10150100443851213", "service": "fb", "text": "sounds like reasonable advice, jeff. I'd caution, too, though, that people have a tendency to throw money at whatever charity (not all charities are equally effective) just to make themselves feel better, without putting much thought into the causes they are supporting or knowing much about the work the organization does.", "timestamp": "1299861098"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150100449911213", "anchor": "fb-10150100449911213", "service": "fb", "text": "@Amelia: definitely. One place that evaluates charities to find the most effective ones is givewell.org", "timestamp": "1299861601"}, {"author": "Evan", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150100453011213", "anchor": "fb-10150100453011213", "service": "fb", "text": "Good logic, good thoughts. Unskilled volunteering is not the best way to contribute, but skilled volunteering can go an incredibly long way. I recently heard about this site (http://catchafire.org/), which is designed to connect non-profits with people looking to donate their professional skills. I think skilled volunteering is as or more valuable than dollars: if an NGO needs a lawyer they are more likely to hire an inexpensive lawyer than a great one for budgetary reasons, even if they receive monetary donations. However, if a great lawyer is looking to give his or her time, they could have access to better skills regardless of their financial standing.", "timestamp": "1299861902"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150100467601213", "anchor": "fb-10150100467601213", "service": "fb", "text": "@Evan: that makes a lot of sense. Their site seems to be based around a lot of short term projects, though. One problem with project-based professional volunteering (we need a a new brand identity!), as opposed to long term professional volunteering (maintain our website!) is that there's a lot of overhead in getting a new person up to speed and making sure they're qualified for the task. One reason that our society bases work around long term employment is to avoid this overhead, and it doesn't go away just because someone is offering to work for free.
There's also the problem that by giving money everyone can offer their help to the most effective charities, while with professional volunteering you're limited more in which charities might need the particular help you can offer. It's the same general reason money works better than bartering: when two people can trade it's much more efficient, but if you're not lucky enough to have just the right match of have and want it doesn't work.", "timestamp": "1299863112"}, {"author": "Sophia", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150100478491213", "anchor": "fb-10150100478491213", "service": "fb", "text": "I'd also recommend, for those who are interested in the ethics of philanthropy a book called \"The Revolution Will Not Be Funded: Beyond the Non-Profit Industrial Complex\" excellent, EXCELLENT critique of how privileged people use their power (i.e. money) to advance the causes they think are important, among many many other issues - not necessarily in reference to small-scale donors, but it does shed a lot of light on who money is being used in regards to actually making social change.", "timestamp": "1299864194"}, {"author": "Mycroft", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150100479976213", "anchor": "fb-10150100479976213", "service": "fb", "text": "You're showing a very upper-middle class bias here. The reality is that \u201cmost people\u201d do not have the option of working more to get paid more money\u2014for a variety of reasons, not the least of which are that many are already working beyond reasonable limits, and that the economy sucks and there just aren't that many jobs available.
Furthermore, this logic leads to the vampire model of nonprofits: they suck your money (blood) away as fast as possible, and then when you have none to give, completely ignore you, or keep saying \u201cwe'll check back in a few months\u201d. This is not how you build a lasting, functional relationship with donors.
Note: I say this having personally been the president of one nonprofit, and contributed substantially to several others. I know in excruciating detail how the industry works.", "timestamp": "1299864367"}, {"author": "Evan", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150100505951213", "anchor": "fb-10150100505951213", "service": "fb", "text": "@Jeff: I agree that money is a more versatile and sustainable way of contributing, and I would not argue that professional skills-based volunteering can work as a complete substitute--I imagine it more as a supplement. I also think that it can make for a much more meaningful contribution experience, in which relationships are developed and the person gets a better sense of personal reward for their donation, meaning they might end up giving more than they would if they only gave money. Clearly not everyone has skills or time to give (or money, for that matter), but for those who do I think it's a great way to put resources back in the system rather than financial giving alone.", "timestamp": "1299866992"}, {"author": "Laura", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150100520776213", "anchor": "fb-10150100520776213", "service": "fb", "text": "Thanks, Mycroft--I was trying to touch on the class privilege but you articulated it much better than I did.", "timestamp": "1299868449"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150100555171213", "anchor": "fb-10150100555171213", "service": "fb", "text": "@Mycroft:
\"the vampire model of nonprofits: they suck your money (blood) away as fast as possible, and then when you have none to give, completely ignore you, or keep saying \u201cwe'll check back in a few months\u201d. This is not how you build a lasting, functional relationship with donors.\"
I don't see how \"I send all the money I have available to give\" is them sucking my blood. I choose to send them money. I also don't see the value of having a relationship with an aid organization.
\"You're showing a very upper-middle class bias here\"
Right. While anyone can try to work more and give away more instead of volunteering, this is more effective in proportion to how well you are paid at your day job.", "timestamp": "1299871686"}, {"author": "Sophia", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150100559701213", "anchor": "fb-10150100559701213", "service": "fb", "text": "Again, I really enjoy this discourse, and I appreciate your putting your ideas out here for us to discuss Jeff, it's a really important issue. Another thing that crossed my mind is, you may also be neglecting the economics of labor distribution w/ in a non-profit. As I sit currently at my internship at a small non-profit, there are lots of low-skilled tasks that need doing, and can be completed w/ little or no explanation or training which can be done for free by volunteers. This is more cost effective than paying the full time staff to do these jobs - their opportunity cost is higher because they could be doing more the more highly skilled tasks that need to be done for which they have training and experience. Just an additional thought on the economics of giving! Then again, I'm only so efficient as I'm not on Facebook!! : P", "timestamp": "1299872141"}, {"author": "Evan", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150100562636213", "anchor": "fb-10150100562636213", "service": "fb", "text": "Ironically I, too, am being paid by a non-profit right now for the \"skill\" of reading and commenting on this facebook note. Maybe they could get \"unskilled\" volunteers to procrastinate for us while full-time staff members did their actual work. Like proxy-crastinators.", "timestamp": "1299872476"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150100563796213", "anchor": "fb-10150100563796213", "service": "fb", "text": "@Sophia:
\"at my internship at a small non-profit, there are lots of low-skilled tasks that need doing, and can be completed w/ little or no explanation or training which can be done for free by volunteers. This is more cost effective than paying the full time staff to do these jobs - their opportunity cost is higher because they could be doing more the more highly skilled tasks that need to be done for which they have training and experience.\"
But instead those volunteers could be donating money to the non-profit, which could use the money to hire someone (currently out of work) to do the tasks. Which ought to be more efficient.", "timestamp": "1299872605"}, {"author": "Michael", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150100565831213", "anchor": "fb-10150100565831213", "service": "fb", "text": "While not necessarily disagreeing with Jeff's argument as a general statement -- as far as efficiency is concerned--it ignores at least two cases that violate the rule: a) if your donated work has a high value (for example, if you are a doctor donating your time to doctors without borders, or a lawyer putting in pro-bono time advising NEFFA, or a lawyer working as a public defender, and b) if your donation of time goes to doing work that it is hard to find people to do, for example, working in a soup kitchen. I also agree with Laura's arguments -- my friend who works in a soup kitchen finds the time she spends doing that to be spiritually refreshing, helping her maintain her sanity working in her high-pressure job, whereas putting in more hours would not bring her more cash, as she's on salary, and getting a second highly-paid job that only called for 4 hours a week, on Sunday mornings, would be difficult to say the least.", "timestamp": "1299872834"}, {"author": "Matthew", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150100610556213", "anchor": "fb-10150100610556213", "service": "fb", "text": "Jeff, Michael, or pretty much anybody else here:
I'm involved in running a community service group at MIT. Every now and then we wonder if we could be making more of a difference by doing something to earn money to donate rather than just going in and doing one-off work. We do fundraising once a semester, but the amount raised is hit-or-miss and we can't really run that constantly. We've been able to find an MIT office which was willing to hire us to collect forms for class registration for a day, but they're switching over to a digital format so we'll lose that source. Do you have any suggestions of places in the Boston area looking to hire a bunch of college students (anywhere from 5-15 at a time) to do work?
Alternately, on the skilled labor side of things, we're a bunch of MIT students and have a pretty good set of science math and technical skills. Do you know of any groups that could use some volunteers with those skills, either on a one-off or ongoing basis? Or an opportunity that those skills could be used to serve by creating a new project?
We'd love to be able to do more good than the current system of mostly one-off unskilled labor projects, so any opportunities to either make money or just do a lot of good would be greatly appreciated.", "timestamp": "1299877686"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150100624391213", "anchor": "fb-10150100624391213", "service": "fb", "text": "@Matthew: what about going around getting people to sign up with giving what we can [1]? People pledge to give 10% of their income to the most effective charity they can find. If you could get even a few people to sign up (and mean it) that would have a much greater effect than what you guys could do working for a day on some group paid or unpaid project.
Alternately, start a startup [2], drop out of school if it looks promising after a while, and if it makes a lot of money give some away. Risk is not a bad thing for young people with high earnings capacity (you guys) or people who want to maximize the good they can do.
[1] http://givingwhatwecan.org
[2] http://paulgraham.com/start.html", "timestamp": "1299879123"}, {"author": "Matthew", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150100640846213", "anchor": "fb-10150100640846213", "service": "fb", "text": "Neat, I hadn't run into Giving What We Can before. It seems pretty hit-or-miss, but you're right that if only a few people sign up that'll do a lot of good. We could probably go door-to-door in some nice neighborhoods around here at night/weekends or campus offices during the day. Do you know if they have any material for non-online efforts? It does seem like their advice on getting involved is of using personal connections. That makes some sense from the standpoint of your original note since just about anybody can be hired as unskilled labor to go door-to-door. Other suggestions in this vein or otherwise?
I've actually just taken your second bit of advice and a month ago in the form of a Y Combinator startup, which I hope will go somewhere and I'll have money to contribute for community service. Until then I'd love to be able to point students who are sticking around for their degrees at ways to help while still being students.
Any startup-y ideas that would provide vehicles to help people? Or other forms of putting skills to use?", "timestamp": "1299880637"}, {"author": "Chris", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150100795776213", "anchor": "fb-10150100795776213", "service": "fb", "text": "I appreciate the thought everyone is putting into this discussion.
As a college student my volunteering activity of choice was to spend an hour a week with a lovely woman named Dorothy who lived in a nursing home in Waltham. Her family did not live close by, so she did not often have visitors to talk to. She liked to talk about her family, what her life was like growing up, and to swap stories about our respective pets.
What about this activity, or a youth oriented organization like Big Brothers Big Sisters? When the goal is building a relationship, I'm not sure thinking in terms of money is quite as useful. Perhaps it would have been more 'efficient' for me to take an extra hour at work (if that hour were available) and donate that money, but isn't the relationship I built with Dolly worth more than 8 bucks a week? Is that the only way we can think about what that hour means?
I say this to bring up the question of whether money is always the best way we have of evaluating charitable activities.", "timestamp": "1299894158"}, {"author": "Jeff Kaufman", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150101087701213", "anchor": "fb-10150101087701213", "service": "fb", "text": "@Chris: one of the hard truths in charity is that some actions are more effective than others. Spending an hour a week with dorothy surely meant a lot to her, and was much better than not doing it. It probably did not, however, have as much positive impact as $8 might if spent on international development. I don't mean you were wrong to volunteer, I think you were doing something useful and valuable, but I suspect it was not what maximized the good you could do with the time you were spending.", "timestamp": "1299937183"}, {"author": "Julia", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150101097791213", "anchor": "fb-10150101097791213", "service": "fb", "text": "\"a very upper-middle class bias\"
Not so. It's well-documented that the lower classes in this country are the most financially generous. The upper middle class actually gives the lowest percent, lower than the poorest or richest.
http://www.portfolio.com/.../02/Alms-From-the-Working-Class
Volunteering is a good way to do some low-skill tasks that can be done in small time chunks, and it can be personally fulfilling. I volunteer for that reason, but I don't kid myself that I'm saving the world with a few hours of tutoring each month. It's more recreation than charity.", "timestamp": "1299938523"}, {"author": "Erica", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150102070901213", "anchor": "fb-10150102070901213", "service": "fb", "text": "Matthew @MIT
I run a math charity in Somerville. We could have used volunteers for our Pi night celebration last Friday. If there are folks who will be in the Boston area over the summer, we could use volunteers who'd like to work on designing an activity for high school kids for our fall competition. BTW, we are an all volunteer organization, so this is a volunteer opportunity.", "timestamp": "1300041319"}, {"author": "Matthew", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150102160786213", "anchor": "fb-10150102160786213", "service": "fb", "text": "A Pi night celebration sounds like lots of fun! Could you e-mail apo@mit.edu if you have anything coming up like that or the fall competition which you could use our help for? I'm pretty sure we'd love to if we can make it.", "timestamp": "1300048494"}, {"author": "Erica", "source_link": "https://www.facebook.com/notes/jeff-kaufman/donate-money-not-time-or-stuff/10150100374356213/?comment_id=10150102385971213", "anchor": "fb-10150102385971213", "service": "fb", "text": "thanks
let's e-mail off FB", "timestamp": "1300068842"}]}