Ask HN: What charities are you donating to this year?

The local food bank. This serves an immediate local need, especially for kids not having lunch at school.

Quote from their website:

> For every $1 donated we can provide 2.5 meals.

In our household we strive to have one dollar meals pretty often, which usually involves produce from our own garden, but I'm still amazed by this ratio.

I found out the food bank I had been giving to pays their CEO (or executive director, I forget) more than $350k a year. To be fair, Their budget is more than 90 million dollars but it seems absurd that a not-for-profit CEO needs that kind of salary. Anyway, I've decided to donate to a Catholic church 2 blocks from where I live. I saw them handing out food during covid and they have a food bank just a couple blocks away from the church where I regularly see lines out the door.

Musana, it’s a small but really really effective organization providing education and health care to people in Uganda. What makes it great is that it is all about using donations from the US to provide infrastructure to build sustainable businesses that empower local people. Website is http://Musana.org. (Disclaimer: been involved/giving/traveling there for 10 years, and am on the board of directors)

I usually donate to public radio, but not the usual NPR-type station. I usually find small stations that do a great job, where your dollar actually makes a difference. Here are two examples:

- Radio Goldfield, Goldfield NV: https://kgfn.org/

- KBRD, Olympia, WA: http://kbrd.org/

Archive.org has a 2-to-1 donation matching thing going on atm: https://archive.org/donate/

They run the world's biggest online library, as well as the wayback machine.

1) Wikipedia. Knowledge about anything and everything, even if topical, for everyone.

2) Erowid. Substances knowledge for those willing to bend their consciousness in new ways to better see themselves and others.

Mercy Ships.

A few years ago I looked at charities with this general criteria was 1) do donations go to the causevs admin etc 2) Does the activity have a significant impact to better peoples lives and 3) Is the impact long-term.

No right answer here but I felt this was the greatest good for my view, and I got to Mercy Ships as my regular donation.

www.mercyships.org

I also occasionally donate small amounts to archive.org, wiki, Kiva and some open source software I regularly use.

Hackers for Charity: https://hackersforcharity.org/

The local animal protection organisation

I donate to Good Food Institute, Sheldrick Wildlife Trust, and Nonhuman Rights Project.

Medicins Sans Fronteries. (Doctors Without Borders). I think they need all the help they can get.

A small charity supporting Christians facing discrimination and persecution in the Middle East.

Gave 100$ to movember :)

my mom :)