[buckminster]

In the UK a typical suggested donation might be £10 per month and the first three payments will go to the sales person's employer - which is typically a third party, not the charity. If you cancel after the first month they get paid but the charity gets nothing. It's sleazier than you think!

[bencollier49]

I'm a member of a club in the UK which raises money for charity - we've stopped giving money to corporate charities because their overheads are such a high percentage of their takings - at this point they're largely just self-perpetuating bureaucracy machines.

We give cash to small volunteer-run charities where we know that 100% of the money raised goes to the cause in question.

[reallydontask]

What do you consider a high percentage?

Looking at Oxfam, it's 10% admin and 7% fundraising [1], which doesn't seem too bad given their global reach.

Admittedly their reputation has taken a bit of a tumble due to the scandals.

[1] https://www.oxfam.org.uk/donate/how-we-spend-your-money

[bencollier49]

I think there's a fairly open question about how those percentages are calculated. Oxfam is an outlier, with a very low stated percentage being used for overheads, but it'd be interesting to see a breakdown of how the remaining cash was used. For example - are staff costs in a target country (say, Haiti) considered admin, or is the UK base only counted?

[tomjen3]

Personally I would like a general rule of no more than 10% split between admin and fundraising, with 5% being considered the normal. 10% makes a nice Schilling fence.

Ideally I won't allow any budget for advertising, because that will just move money from one charity to another.

Alternatively I would only donate to the top of Give Well.

[raverbashing]

For most of those charity orgs, you're being more generous to the middle men than to those in need

[mikorym]

I like the charity-starts-at-home approach. I don't know how people do this in first world countries, but in developing countries is relatively easy to find a cause.

[hiq]

That's insane. A better approach to donating to charities could be: https://www.givewell.org/charities/top-charities

If you want to give to a charity because you heard about it on the street, at least try to give the money directly and cut the middle man.