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I have recently reached a point in my life where I want to start making regular donations to worthwhile charities, but I have no idea which charity is most "deserving" of my money.

I understand that this is very subjective and what seems very worthwhile to one may seems rather pointless to another. Therefore, I will likely have to make a judgement call at some point in the process.

So, for the sake of this question, let's assume my ultimate goal is to maximize the number of human lives saved. But I would like for answers to focus on the process to find the right charity to fulfill that goal, rather than to simply suggest one. That way the process can hopefully be transferred to find charities best suited to other goals.

How do I find the charity that will save the most human lives per dollar donated?

Which charitable cause is the most worthwhile one?

That's a very broad and difficult question, both ethically and practical. I do not fathom to estimate whether a dollar spent on vaccinations in country A is worth more or less than a dollar spent on education in country B, clean drinking water in country C, helping the homeless in country D, protecting a persecuted minority in country E, researching a deadly disease in country F or so, so many other causes.

There is just too much to consider:

• How much direct or indirect suffering does a problem cause?


• How much money is needed to fix the problem?


• What is the risk that the effort will be pointless or even counter-productive?


• What negative side-effects could happen from the cause?


• Is the solution proposed by a given cause a long-term solution which will sustain itself or a short-term solution which will require donations in the future?


• Looking at global trends for the future, will the problem likely become better or worse if left to itself?


• If you do not donate to the cause, how likely is it that other entities will take care of the problem?

Estimating all these points requires expert knowledge specific to the issue at hand. And even experts usually disagree widely on such estimates. I would dare to say that it is not humanly possible to objectively rate all charitable causes worldwide by worthwhileness.

But one objective criteria you can use to pick a charity is to check which charity organizations actually spend money on their causes and which use their income mostly to pay for themselves. Charity organizations usually have to publish financial statements. See how much money they spend on fundraising and administrative costs and how much actually goes to their program(s). The percentages vary a lot.

But if one charity spends more on administration than another then that does not necessarily mean it's a less effective charity. A staff of well-paid full time professionals might be better at judging how to spend money most efficiently than a bunch of hobbyist volunteers.

Another good advise for effective altruism can be: "Think global, act local". Instead of looking for a globally operating mega-charity like the Red Cross or UNICEF, see which local organizations do good work in your community. That way you can observe the direct and indirect effects of your donations yourself. That way you can make a more educated decision about whether or not an organization is worthy to keep receiving your support.

You're clearly aware of the subjective nature of your question, so I won't hit too hard on that point, but I think it would be worthwhile to spend a bit of time focusing on the type of impact you'd like to have.

You clearly want to make an impact, so it would be helpful to think about issues that matter to you. Comparing causes is like comparing apples to oranges. It's hard to definitively determine whether issues related to the environment, poverty, or disease are more important. You can, however, decide which type of issue align best with the impact you want to have.

From there, you can start your search for the best charity in that field.

I like checking Charity Navigator and Charity Watch to learn more about the impact of every dollar contributed.

GiveWell takes things a step further by providing further research on the true impact of the charitable activities. A charity may be well-run and financially efficient, but the work may not be as impactful as you would expect. This is where GiveWell's research comes in. For example, I remember they did a case study on a charity that replaced wells in Africa with childrens playground toys (designed to have the children pump the water while playing). While on paper this may have seemed like a good idea, it turned out the children got bored of the pumps and the women from the village had to work twice as hard to get water.

You can also look at GiveWell's approved charity list to generate ideas.

Phillipp provided a detailed answer. I agree with his take on this. I believe that it is not possible to determine what charity that will save the most human lives per dollar donated because the charitable effectiveness vis a vis mortality or quality of life is totally subjective. But you can evaluate the efficiency of the charity.

I use Guidestar and Charity Navigator to look at the financials of the charities that I donate to. In short summary, Guidestar ranks 1.6 million nonprofits registered in the U.S. based on:

• IRS Tax Status


• Revenue


• Length of Operations


• Location


• Public Support


• Fundraising Expenses


• Administrative Expenses

You can read in greater detail at:

Guidestar

Charity Navigator

EDIT: Oops. After posting this I noticed your tag of Germany. Look for similar organizations there that rank charities.

You ask:

How do I find the charity that will save the most human lives per dollar donated?

You do it by first being clear about your goals and the means you want to use to achieve those goals, and then connecting with people whose business it is to interact with such charities.

In more detail:

1. Define carefully what "save" means: prolong healthy life, delay death in terminal patients, delay the onset of symptoms in carriers, spread the gospel, etc. Be as specific as you can.




2. Work out which part in the 'value-chain', so to speak, you want to focus on. For example, suppose you want to prolong healthy life. You could look at the promotion of healthy living, food supplements, wholesome family life, pollution-reduction, etc. One of the simplest dichotomies is prevention vs cure, or from a different perspective, whether it is more satisfying for you to solve or to help. The answer isn't always easy to pick. For example, if someone is injured at a poorly-designed intersection, you can either help the injured person or help redesign the intersection. You might even want to do both. But if you are forced to pick one because your time/money/etc is limited, which would you pick? That's the basic dichotomy.




3. Work with large philanthropy organisations to help identify and shortlist the candidates meeting your criteria, as well as to help refine the criteria themselves. These organisations may be public trustee companies that make a business out of investing other people's money (gifts) in perpetuity to earn enough income to keep on supporting the kinds of charities the gifts were intended for. You might run into the problem that the only charities they can support are those that are tax-exempt. However, they may be able to help identify potential beneficiaries even if they can't help with administering the gifts.




4. Determine the best structure to use as a vehicle for giving. This could be simply giving out of your own pocket, setting up an entity (company, trust, etc), or participating in an existing entity such as a public trust/foundation. It isn't 'one size fits all'; there are many things to consider, such as the size of the initial gift, whether and how often you'll be adding to the gift principal, whether you're gifting the principal outright or investing the principal to gift the income it generates, etc.




5. Do it.

Get a Donor Advised Fund

The first thing you need is a Donor Advised Fund. This will allow you to do several things:

• Allow you to make complex donations, even to charities that can't accept them because they don't have the workload or skill to process the gift. For instance, in the US there is tax advantage to donating appreciated assets rather than selling them and donating the proceeds. Sorting out gifts like this is what the DAF does. We were once donated an apartment building; I really wish that person had donated it to his DAF with instructions.


• Decouple the timing of your charitable deduction from tax timing. Tat way you are not rushed to donate to charity when your research is not yet complete.


• Donate pseudonymously, where that is appropriate.


• Protect you from getting swindled by charities that are not genuine, because DAF staff impartially researches legality of the the instructed gift and recipient without any emotional entanglement.

Research / talk to the charity

Really, at this point, the question becomes wildly subjective. It really boils down to doing research on the charity via reputable third parties; US services like GuideStar are valuable if the charity solicits in the US. And also, you should be talking to the charity itself; talking to you is literally the job of the Executive Director and his staff.