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Comment by pavlov | Hacker News Reader

There are lots of apps to plan and track one's investments. Maybe there should be an app to track one's donations too.

If I could see a history of what was the ROI (in terms of money spent on actual programs) of my monthly donations, and also easily reallocate those donations to other charities, I'd certainly check up on that app every once in a while.

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I've used Charity navigator for years. They have alway been a very good source of high-quality charities to ensure the bulk of the donation goes to the actual cause. It even has audit information breaking down the distribution of funds. Givewell is another recommendation.

https://www.charitynavigator.org

https://www.givewell.org/

+1 Management vs advertising vs program spending can drastically vary from charity to charity. And there are some bad practices even by very well-known names (see: ad spend).

Another resource I’ve found super helpful is The Life You Can Save by Peter Singer. Very interesting read/listen and gets you thinking about the most impactful ways to give. Free to download or listen as well: https://www.thelifeyoucansave.org/the-book

I don't know if this is any help but it looked interesting:

https://www.charitywatch.org/top-rated-charities

I believe this is the idea of effective altruism.

I believe part of it is about measuring quantitative indicators of program quality, but they also seem to go for the more fraught project of trying to put a dollar figure on the value of the outcomes. Or a “quality-adjusted life years” figure, or whatever have you.

It feels like that frame of mind selects for a very specific sense of success.

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