Happy Holidays everyone. Up until very recently, Martin and Tom Crowley (DFS Superstars) and I were all having losing years gambling and it was not looking like we were able to put a drive together. But we caught some end of year run-good, and here we are! Here is a link to last year’s drive.
We will be matching up to $1,000,000 to the following 10 charities. What that means is, if you donate email a copy of the receipt to receiptsforcharity@gmail.com , we will donate the same amount. * Note: I will have someone managing the email account this year, if you need to reach me please include : Attention Dan: in the subject line.*
You can also donate directly through 2017charitydrive.com
If you are an American using paypal or a credit card, please donate to the charity directly email us the receipt to ensure you can write off the deduction.
Charities
Givewell’s Recommendations:
- Against Malaria Foundation: Mosquito nets are very cheap ($2), and very effective at reducing the spread of Malaria. 500,000 people per year die, and 400 million fall ill. Very cost effective way to make a difference. More information: https://www.againstmalaria.com/
- Schistosomiasis Control Initiative: Around 2 billion people in the world are infected with parasites and intestinal worms; around half of them children. This illness doesn’t exist in the first world because it is so cheap to fix; for around $1.19, a child can be dewormed. More information: https://www.givewell.org/charities/Schistosomiasis-Control-Initiative
- Give Directly: My personal favorite charity. They give money to the extremely poor, and allow them to decide what to do with it. For 65 cents per day, you can support someone in Kenya. This has the added benefit of giving us some data to study on the effects of a Universal Basic Income. They also helped out Houston after the devastating hurricanes this year. Their website: https://www.givedirectly.org/ Donate: https://www.givedirectly.org/give-now
- Hellen Keller International’s Vitamin A Supplementation Program:
For 75 cents, they can deliver a Vitamin A supplement which reduces likelihood of blindness and death. More information: https://www.givewell.org/charities/helen-keller-international
Artificial Intelligence Charities:
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Machine Intelligence Research Institute (MIRI): Elon Musk, Bill Gates, and Stephen Hawking have all spoke out about the risks of artificial intelligence. Waitbutwhy piece did a great, but super long piece explaining how this could become an issue: http://waitbutwhy.com/2015/01/artificial-intelligence-revolution-1.html
Their site: https://intelligence.org/research/
Donate: https://intelligence.org/donate/
Animal Charities:
- The Good Food Institute: In their own words “We work with scientists, investors, and entrepreneurs to make groundbreaking good food a reality. We focus on clean meat and plant-based alternatives to animal products- foods that are more delicious, safer to eat, and better for the planet than their animal counterparts. Their website: http://www.gfi.org/ Donate: https://www.gfi.org/donate
- The Animal Welfare Fund: This fund will support organizations that work on improving the wellbeing of nonhuman animals, especially farmed animals. Their website. They are supported by the Open Philanthropy Project (which arose out of Givewell).
Bail Funds:
The basic idea is that there are a lot of people held on bail in misdemeanor cases where if they were out they could fight the case, but to get out of jail they take pleas and get criminal records. This can have all sort of collateral consequences on jobs, school, housing, etc and thus contributes to the widening socioeconomic gap in the U.S.
A fund that posts these people’s bail would have very slow attrition. According to The Bronx Freedom Fund, 97% of clients attend all scheduled court dates. This would save lot of people from criminal records and jail time. The Massachusetts Bail Fund only posts bail that is $500 or less. No one should have to sit in jail because they don’t have $200.
There was a great blog post by Slate Star Codex discussing the merits of Bail Funds including some cost effectiveness estimates.
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Massachusetts Bail Fund: Their site: https://www.massbailfund.org/ Donate: https://www.massbailfund.org/donate.html
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Brooklyn Bail Fund: https://brooklynbailfund.org/
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Just City (based out of Memphis): https://justcity.org/
Why Donate?
Aside from whether you believe humans are morally obligated to help others, even if you are concerned about your own self interests, there are strong reasons to donate. Studies show that donating to charity can increase happiness. On a personal level, I view the 2016 drive as hands down my greatest accomplishment.
Of course there is also the tax benefit. If you donate $100 and are in a 27% tax bracket, it only costs you effectively $73. $73 out of pocket leading to $200 in the hands of a great charity is a pretty hot deal if you ask me!
Crypto
Yes, we can sort out accepting crypto for donations, please email us to address specifics. I know a lot of people with incredibly large percentages of their networth in various cryptocurrencies. The logic is generally “Well even if this were to go to zero, I still have a pretty sweet life.” I think along the same lines, you can make the argument that you are a prime candidate to consider donating some money to charity.
Disclaimer:
Everything we do will be in good faith for charity, and we are allowing ourselves some mild creative liberties (ie balancing out money between various bail funds if one gets much more than others).
Please do not email us other causes as this only creates extra work for us. There are lots of great options out there, and unfortunately we do not have time to go through them all.
The drive will go through December 31st, ending at 12:00 Pacific Time.
Thanks for reading and your consideration,
-Dan Smith