It makes NO sense to donate to charity until you are retired

What about the needy marathon major runner's who need sponsorship to run. We all have one in our office.

You are me and i am you wrote:

Donating to charity is silly when you’re in the middle class. Your $50-100 isn’t going to accomplish anything. At least 25% of it will get eaten up by administrative fees. Take your wife out to eat or throw it into your kid’s college savings account instead. Most people aren’t truly financially well off enough that they should be giving even a dime of their money away before retirement.

If you work for a nonprofit university, every dime will go to your area of interest. The employees’ salaries come from the university budget and not the donation. You could support medical research, need-based scholarships, etc.

I get the idea of the poster. Give $100 now or be savvy and give more later. I think it depends on the charity.

I don't know about God, but my Dog gets really pissed if I don't share and give to my fellow humans. Get up offa that thing and give, brothers and sisters.

For starters to be classified nonprofit or charity you need to be registered thought your states Secretary of States registration, and that means you're classified as a chartered non profit, of course you will have a tax ID number too. Being a 501c3 is a step some charitys move into next if they chose, or down the road in some cases, as that step is expensive and can take up to a year to go through. Still they can fundraise and do program services till they chose to take that step. Now let's visit that 5% rule, as l have a friend who works full time running a nonprofit assisting dogs and cats. It is his job, and he drives all over, putting miles on his car and so on. The non profit takes in a small amount of money in terms of any major charity.He actually is paid way under market value for his services as well as well. He does all the fundraising by himself too, basically 75% of the work he does. What should he pay himself? 2k a year? That would be slavery. The correct way to pay a president of a nonprofit is fair market value. Now 5% of the funds to overhead is not fair. I think we are thinking of multi million dollar charity's.But what if your charity is struggling and only taking in 40, or 50k,or something? Don't get me wrong,if a charity is taking in 2 million a year, you better be doing something, and at this point we can start taking %.

The presence and spreading of corruption

in the charity game is just too daunting for me to throw my hard earned tiny pension into and watch it swirl away down the drain into the pockets of a system full of grifters.

I very selectively, personally and carefully donate clothes, cash, and even my good Chevvy truck to well-vetted causes.

The Trump administration itself has added to my distrust. Hard to trust any system or "cause" that is in any way connected with the current crop of crooks in Washington D.C.

health wrote:

It helps mentally to spend time helping others regularly.

Ok, give me some money

Jamesengle6 wrote:

The presence and spreading of corruption

in the charity game is just too daunting for me to throw my hard earned tiny pension into and watch it swirl away down the drain into the pockets of a system full of grifters.

I very selectively, personally and carefully donate clothes, cash, and even my good Chevvy truck to well-vetted causes.

The Trump administration itself has added to my distrust. Hard to trust any system or "cause" that is in any way connected with the current crop of crooks in Washington D.C.

Why must we make this political?

another perspective wrote:

You’re talking about donating cash to charities, in which case, it just depends on your tax situation. Maybe you’re young and in a higher tax bracket where it might make sense to donate stock or cash to charities. Definitely research the charity first, but I wouldn’t say it’s a bad idea to donate to a charity. Like others have pointed out, you can donate items other than cash to charities and have it be worth your while. But since you seem to be specifically referring to cash, then it’ll depend on your tax situation. I personally like the KickStarter/GoFundMe’s but to each his own.

Good reply. But regarding tax deductions, Kickstarter is almost always not tax-deductible, but instead normally considered a personal gift.

For GoFundMe, this explains it well:

"Gofundme has a program that certifies a list of qualified charities under §501(c) as non-profits. This program is known as the Gofundme certified charity campaign. Those qualifying for this campaign will have a (ü) badge followed by the words “Certified Charity” if the gofundme campaign qualifies for as a charitable organization for a tax deduction."