Effective altruism

When I was younger, I donated money to a range of nature and wildlife charities, mostly because I didn't care too much for humans.  I also spread my donations around, rather than focus on a single one.  Growing older and (perhaps) wiser, I decided to start making monthly donations to a single charity, and I chose the British Red Cross, partly because I now appreciate how important humanitarian campaigns are, but mostly because I couldn't be arsed to research UK charities.

Of course, no sooner did I set up the direct debit than a newspaper revealed that the CEO of the British Red Cross was paid £184,000 (US $307,000) per year!  While I appreciate the Red Cross is a large organisation that requires strong leadership, and that a good CEO will more than earn his salary through fund-raising, and that his salary represents only 0.08% of expenses, I still had an issue that the head a charity earns more than the UK prime minister (£142,000/year).

I don't have any deep, personal convictions that make me want to give to a specific cause, so in lieu of that I went online to find a charity.  What I found was that there are over 180,000 registered charities in the UK, not including small charities (less than £5,000/year) that are not required to register.  The 10 biggest are:

1. The Arts Council of England --  A quasi-government agency which "champions, develops and invests in artistic and cultural experiences that enrich people's lives" by spending £621 million/year of taxpayer money.
   
2. The GAVI Fund Affiliate -- Its web-site clearly spells out its agenda: "Enters into pledge agreements with sovereign IFFIm donors and approves funding of programmes with IFFIm proceeds."  "IFFIm" is the International Finance Facility for Immunisation, which was technically set up by the UK, France, Italy, Norway, Australia, Spain, the Netherlands, Sweden, and South Africa, but was really established by Bill Gates.  (GAVI stands for "Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunisation.")  I don't think they are interested in donations of less than US $750 million.
   
3. Cancer Research UK.  Their pithy motto is "We beat cancer" although, in spite of raising £515 million/year, I think cancer is clearly winning.
4. The National Trust (or to use its full name, the National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty) raises £405 million/year for conservation in England, Wales and Northern Ireland (but not Scotland).  Founded in 1895, it tends to focus on English country houses.  It is the largest membership organisation in the UK, one of the largest landowners in the UK, and its president is Prince Charles.  It motto is "For ever, for everyone."
5. Oxfam started in 1942 as the Oxford Committee for Famine Relief, to petition the British government to allow food through the World War II blockade into Axis-occupied Greece.  (Over 300,000 civilians starved to death in Athens alone.)  It shortened its name in 1965, and today it raises £318 million/year mainly through its 700 charity shops selling recycled clothes and second-hand books.  It was recently in the news for asking Scarlett Johansson to stop endorsing SodaStream because one of their factories is in an Israeli settlement in the West Bank. Instead, Ms. Johansson resigned as Oxfam's ambassador, citing "a fundamental difference of opinion in regards to the boycott, divestment and sanctions movement."  I've discussed this with an employee of Oxfam, who clearly believed Oxfam was in the wrong on this.  Well done, Ms. Johansson.
   
6. The Save the Children Fund was also established in response to a British food blockade, although this time it was to Germany after World War I.  (Britain continued the blockade after the armistice treaty had been signed!) The founder outlined what she saw as the rights of every child:
• The child must be given the means requisite for its normal development, both materially and spiritually.
• The child that is hungry must be fed, the child that is sick must be nursed, the child that is backward must be helped, the delinquent child must be reclaimed, and the orphan and the waif must be sheltered and succored.
• The child must be the first to receive relief in times of distress.
• The child must be put in a position to earn a livelihood, and must be protected against every form of exploitation.
• The child must be brought up in the consciousness that its talents must be devoted to the service of its fellow men.
7. Number 7 is the International Finance Facility for Immunisation, which really just turns its funds over to GAVI, so I'm not sure how much of its £240 million/year is really just counted twice.
8. The British Heart Foundation raises £213 million/year for heart disease, and has over 730 charity shops in the UK.  Unfortunately, along with Cancer Research UK, the Alzheimer's Society and Parkinson's UK, the British Heart Foundation supports animal testing.  My personal feeling is that, while animal testing has undoubtedly helped humans, it is (and always has been) far too uncontrolled, used too quickly and with little consideration given for the welfare of the animals, before or after testing.  In the UK, new drugs are still required to be "tested" on two species of mammals (including a "non-rodent") and over 4 million scientific experiments on animals took place in 2012, a rise of 8% over the previous year, with primates and genetically modified animals being used more often.  Until this is controlled, I really have trouble funding animal research.
   
9. The British Red Cross comes in at £214 million/year.  I should note (in case you didn't read the entire newspaper article--shame on you) that the CEO's pay went up by 12 percent as the charity’s revenue went down by three percent over the past three years.
10. And this one surprised me: The Royal Commonwealth Society for the Blind (with the working title, "Sightsavers") raises £173 million/year!  Started only in 1950 by a blind lawyer, its patron is the Queen, and its goal is to eliminate "preventable" blindness throughout the developing world, which is primarily caused by cataracts and the trachoma bacteria. It is one of only nine charities given a 'high performance' rating by the UK Department for International Development last year, plus the CEO is only paid £65,000/year.  However, for every £1 it raises, it spends nearly 24p on fund raising.

The next 10 include The Royal National Lifeboat Institution (RNLI), the National Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children, the Salvation Army, Macmillan Cancer Support, Marie Curie Cancer Care, Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, Royal Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, Christian Aid, the Cup Trust, and Genome Research Limited.  (The RNLI is the equivalent of the US Coast Guard, except in the UK it is entirely funded by donations and volunteers.)

Special callout goes out to The Cup Trust, number 19 on the list, which raised £176 million in funds yet disbursed just £152,292 in grants to charitable causes!  The Trust borrowed money from individuals and used it to purchase bonds, which were then sold to the same individuals at well below market value.  They in turn sold the bonds at market value and donated the proceeds to the Trust, which then repaid those loans.  So I lend £1 to the Trust, it buys a bond worth £1, and sells it to me for 50p.  I then sell the bond for £1 and donate the £1 to the Trust, which pays me back the £1 I originally loaned it. So what's the harm?  Because that £1 "donation" is now eligible for "Gift Aid."

In the US, where you have to file your taxes, you deduct charitable donations from your gross income, so you don't pay tax on it. In the UK, where most people don't file taxes, the government created a scheme where charities could "claim back" the tax paid on donations, which is worth about 28p per £1.  And the Cup Trust duly submitted a claim for £46 million (US $77 million).  The audacity is just staggering.  Fortunately, the HMRC (UK's equivalent of the IRS) denied their claim.  The Charity Commission then investigated but found that, since the Trust did give away 0.08% of its income to charitable causes, it was a bona fide charity!  Of course, this certainly calls into question the point of the Charity Commission if it finds such fraud in flagrante and still does nothing about it!

Number 20 -- Genome Research Limited -- is wholly owned by "The Wellcome Trust," which was set up by Sir Henry Wellcome, an American with a ridiculous mustache who came to the UK in 1880 to sell medicine in tablet form.  Although tablets had been in use in America for 40 years, in England pharmacists were still grinding medicine with a mortar-and-pestle.  Wellcome ushered in the age of modern medicine by trademarking the term "tabloid," giving free samples to doctors, and doing direct marketing to consumers.  And it made him stupendously wealthy.  The Trust is the third wealthiest foundation in the world, worth around £14.5 billion.  (For comparison, Bill and Melinda Gates is #2 and J. Paul Getty is #6.)  And last year it apparently gave £93 million to Genome Research.

"Tabloid," by the way, became generic for anything in a compressed form.  Traditional "broadsheet" newspapers were 29.5 inches x 23.5 inches, but when compact newspapers measuring 17 × 11 inches were introduced, they became known as "tabloids."  But I digress...

So anyway, the point of all this is I'm looking for suggestions. A friend recommended Hope for Justice, which works to end human trafficking in the UK.  While I think that's an admirable goal, I'm not entirely sure what they do.  Their web site mentions they "helped" 78 people last year, but is rather vague on the specifics.  They also don't disclose--although I read elsewhere--that they are a Christian-based organisation, and I've always been wary of Christian-based organisation because their brand of charity can be--shall we say--rather selective. (i.e. We're happy to help, as long as you're a white, straight, and Christian.)  Of course that's a gross generalisation, but again I'd need to do more research before I signed up.

She also suggested a group that promotes a "Living Wage," which is somehow calculated as the minimum a person actually requires to live on.  (As opposed to the "minimum wage," which assures you will be on government benefits for the rest of your life.)  Unfortunately my libertarian beliefs are in conflict with this idea, and that artificially inflating wages helps no one in the long term.  As a citizen of the world, suggesting that people in London should earn £8.80 (US $15) per hour when more than a third of the world's population lives on less than $2 a day seems biased and short-sighted.

It has to be a UK charity, simply for tax purposes. Lots of worthwhile causes but hard to judge their effectiveness.  If you have any recommendations, let me know. 

P.S. Two charities which never fail to bring a smile to my face are Worldvision -- which gives donkeys to farmers -- and the Donkey Sanctuary -- which takes donkeys away from farmers.  In my cynical little heart, I  just know these two are working in collusion.