Originally Posted by Xazy

I give over 10% of income pre-tax to charitey, which is a Jewish religeous thing. I am very careful in where I give the money, and probably every year the breakdown where I give changes. But my belief tends to be to give if it can help friends/family first (I consider that to be charitey if they need help), then local organizations, then anywhere else.

I used to do be very active in different organizations but got tired of all the different community politics, so now I support them only financially (also I am married and have less time for that).

But to me the key is find something you believe in get to know the organization well, then support. A local organization started doing something I really disagree with, supporting an individual by giving him a large salary for doing nothing, while I like the idea but I am not giving money to them to support him I am giving them for some other reasons. So they lost my support and I told one of the heads exactly why.

I find it sad how people can just give to an organization that may support a good cause without doing any investigation. My wife worked for an organazation that helped 9-11 victoms (well the children of), and it was funded largely by the Red Cross. And the organization had so much waste and really by and large was very ineffective and did nothing. Yet millions went in to it.