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Peter Hurford

How do the extremely poor live?

This post is the first in a series of three on the lifestyle of a people living in extreme poverty. It was originally published on Peter's blog, 

We know that the extremely poor are living on less than what $1.25 a day could buy in the United States. But this seems implausible. Wouldn’t someone with that little money just end up dying of starvation very quickly? Simulations like the 

 can only go so far. It’s difficult to understand what it’s like to be that poor.

However, it’s now becoming a bit easier to understand. Abhijit V. Banerjee and Esther Duflo, authors of the popular book 

Poor Economics: A Radical Rethinking of the Way to Fight Global Poverty

The Abdul Latif Jameel Poverty Action Lab

. Using survey data from thirteen different countries, Banerjee and Duflo are able to tell the tale of life as a poor person.

The typical extremely poor household tends to be much larger than a US family. The extremely poor households have a median of 8 people living in them, compared to 2.5 in the US. However, it’s not typically a couple with many children like one might expect -- there actually is a median of 3 adults in a household. This suggests a family structure where people live with their parents, siblings, uncles, cousins, etc., which makes sense given it is easier to pool resources when you are sharing a space.

However, poor households do have more children than US households, having about 3 children per woman of child-bearing age, as compared to 1.9 in the US or 1.6 in Europe. The population of extremely poor areas is also very young in general. While the US has about one young person (age below 18) for every old person (age above 51), extremely poor areas have a median of six young people for every adult person.

This helps to explain why interventions targeted on children, such as school deworming, can have a large impact on the future of these countries - most of the population is young. It also helps to explain higher rates of violence or political instability in poor countries, as violence everywhere is overwhelmingly committed by young men according to Steven Pinker’s 

One of the most common traits of being extremely poor is weakness and disease. Because of low food consumption and poor nutrition, 65% of the poor in Udaipur, India (the area with the best data) are underweight.

43% of the adults report having difficulty with "activities of daily living", and this includes 34% of adults under 50. Furthermore, 55% of the poor have an insufficient red blood cell count (anaemia). In the last month, 72% of the poor in Udaipur reported at least one symptom of a disease and 46% of the poor reported seeing a doctor because of a disease.

Despite constant sickness, self-reported levels of health and happiness are not particularly low, but self-reported levels of stress (both financial and psychological) are very high.

Furthermore, infant mortality is still high. Surveys have asked women about the outcomes of their pregnancies, including whether the child is still alive. Infant mortality is the number of children who die before reaching their first birthday, as a percentage of the number of live births. Among the poor, this number is at a low of 3.4% in Indonesia and a high of 16.7% in Pakistan, compared to 0.5% in Europe. Notably, these numbers are likely to be underestimates because not all children are remembered, especially if they die very early.

The typical poor person could spend about 30% more on food if they wanted to, cutting out all other spending and all savings. Also, the poor don’t buy food optimally. The cheapest way to eat, in terms of calories per dollar, would be to buy the grain ‘millet’. However, only about two-thirds of food spending was on millets, with another 20% on rice (which costs about twice as much per calorie), another 10% on wheat (70% more expensive than millets per calorie), and almost 7% on sugar (which is the most expensive per calorie and has no other nutritional value).

Despite having more ability to buy food, the poor don’t eat much -- the households in the bottom 10% of per capita expenditure consume less than 1400 calories a day on average, which is about half of what is recommended for a man with moderate activity, or a woman with heavy physical activity.

Furthermore, going without food is quite common. In Udaipur, 45% of poor households reported adults cutting the size of their meal and 12% of households reported children having to cut the size of their meal as well. In addition, 37% of poor households in Udaipur reported going without a meal for an entire day within the last year.

, one of GiveWell’s top charities that gives cash transfers to the extremely poor, 

 in their target area of Kenya, “well over half of adults skip meals, less than half of household members eat until they are content, people commonly go to sleep hungry, and a paltry 18% report having enough food for tomorrow”.

One type of food that is frequently bought in South India is a dosa, or a rice and beans pancake that almost everyone eats for breakfast. This can be bought frequently for a rupee, which is approximately 15 US cents (PPP adjusted).

All pictures are from GiveWell’s site visit to Kenya for Give Directly, used with permission from Elie Hassenfeld.

Emma Howard

Tax efficient giving: A guide for UK donors

At Giving What We Can we believe in not only in donating to the 

 in need of funding, but we also believe that when giving it is important to make prudent and informed tax-deductible donations to make your money count the most where it possibly can.

Before making a donation, there are some important rules you should be aware of that govern the gifting of money to charity.

Put simply, there are two facets to pay attention to when thinking about tax and giving:

Is my chosen charity eligible for tax deductions/ Gift Aid?

How can I reduce my own tax bill by donating?

Whilst there are no legal restrictions to the amount of charities you decide to support or the size of the donation you want to make to a registered charity, at Giving What We Can we advise against breaking a donation up between multiple charities when giving small amounts, as this reduces the impact your donation can have. There are some tax implications to consider before going ahead with your donation. It might seem like a lot of extra effort to go to, but by making tax-efficient donations you can substantially increase the value of your donation to your chosen charity. What’s more, by making charitable donations it is also possible to reduce your own income tax bill if you are in the higher earning bracket. Here are a couple of the most tax-efficient schemes to look out for:

 was a scheme introduced by the UK government to support registered charities. This scheme allows registered charities to reclaim income tax in order to boost the value of donations made. As income is so variable and for simplicity’s sake, charities can only reclaim income tax at the basic 20% rate on each donation. In practice, this means that if you donate £10, the charity will actually receive £12.50 by claiming back on Gift Aid, plus additional government subsidies that we won’t go into here.

Additionally, if you are a higher income taxpayer who pays a 40-50% tax rate (i.e. if your income falls in the region of £41,866 - £150,000+ per annum) , you are eligible to reclaim the difference of the 20-30% you were charged on top of the deductible 20% Gift Aid rate the charity receives.

In the 21 years since Gift Aid was introduced, registered charities have garnered an additional 

 in tax reclaims on donations in the UK. However, the Charities Aid Foundation (CAF) estimates that an additional £750 million pounds of potential tax reclaim benefit goes unclaimed each year. This represents a vast loss of resources that could be materially changing and saving lives if allocated effectively!

In order to claim any tax benefits for both yourself and the charity, the organization you are donating to must be a registered charity for tax purposes by the HM Revenue and Customs (

). You can check this by looking for the charity’s HMRC reference number on their website or by asking your charity to confirm that it has an HMRC charity reference number if you cannot find it listed online. Gift Aid can be applied to any UK, EU, Norwegian or Icelandic charity that is registered with the HMRC, but you have to be a UK taxpayer to be eligible for Gift Aid.

If your donations are made under the Gift Aid Scheme, you may need to fill out a 

 in order for your charity to claim tax back on your donation. This form authorizes the charity to claim Gift Aid on your behalf. In order to be eligible for Gift Aid, you must be a UK taxpayer and have paid enough income tax or capital gains tax to cover the amount the charity will reclaim on your donation.

If you haven’t paid enough Income Tax this year to claim the 20% Gift Aid tax rebate on your donation, it is possible to "

" and reclaim Gift Aid on donations from the previous tax year by completing a request via a Self Assessment Form, or by contacting your 

You will need to keep records of all donations you make to registered charities including the dates and amounts, as well as any receipts for bank transfers or cash donations. Details about how to record your donations can be found 

You can make a Gift Aid eligible donation to one of our recommended charities 

If you require tax reclaims as a higher rate taxpayer (paying tax at 40% or more), you will need to either fill in a 

Giving through your pay or pension to charity

You can also give money to charity directly from your pay or personal pension by using the 

 scheme in the UK. This is an easy way to increase the value of your donation at the least cost to yourself, as your donation is deducted from your gross salary BEFORE tax, so you don’t pay any tax on it. For example, if you give £1 through PayRoll Giving, it will only cost you 80p before tax, and 60p if you are a higher rate taxpayer.

Using the Payroll scheme you can give to as many charities as you like and you can cancel your Payroll giving agreement at any time.

Capital Gains Tax refers to the tax that is due when you give away, sell, exchange or otherwise dispose of certain assets such as shares or property, and by doing so you exceed your annual exemption limit for that tax year. In the UK, this is currently £10,900 for each individual and £5,450 for most trustees in the current tax year of 2014. All gifts to charity qualify for Capital Gains Tax Relief. In practice, this means that all gifts to charity are exempt from tax. Additionally, in 

 you can file these donations as losses to reduce your Capital Gains Tax liability elsewhere.

Declarations of capital gains and losses are made through the Self Assessment tax return system; for more information on what you need to report, visit the 

. Usually you don’t need to complete a self assessment tax return, but you will need to complete a 

Income Tax relief on Gifts of Shares/ Assets:

Income Tax refers to the tax on your income. Your income includes the earnings you make from employment, interest on savings or income from rentals or a trust and your pension.

You can claim Income Tax relief on gifts and lower your tax bill if you:

Give land or buildings in the UK or qualifying shares to a charity;

Sell these to a charity at less than their market value;

Qualifying shares include those listed on any stock exchange.

Income Tax relief works a little differently to Capital Gains Tax relief in that not all gifts to charity are eligible for Income Tax relief.

The assets on which you can claim Income Tax relief are restricted to the following:

Shares and securities listed on the UK or another internationally recognised stock exchange;

Units held in a FCA authorised unit trust;

Shares held in a UK OEIC (Open Ended Investment Company);

Certain foreign collective investments – similar to 

You can find more information on gifting assets to charity and the tax relief available by visiting the 

Inheritance Tax is paid on an estate when somebody dies. If you leave a gift to charity in your will at least seven years before your death, its value will not be included when valuing your estate (which includes your possessions, property and money) for Inheritance Tax purposes.

Moreover, any estate that is valued at more than the £325,000 Inheritance Tax threshold is eligible for a reduction in Inheritance Tax by donating part of the estate to a registered charity. If you donate 10% or more of the estate to a qualifying UK registered charity, the rate of Inheritance Tax applied to any value in your estate that exceeds the £325,000 threshold will be reduced from 40% to 36% in total tax charged.

However, unfortunately not all parts of the estate may qualify for the reduced rate of Inheritance Tax. It is therefore important to consider whether the 10% donation will benefit your beneficiaries according to the make-up and total value of the entire estate. For more information on reducing your Inheritance Tax bill by donating to charity, visit the 

Keeping records of your donations to charity

The importance of record-keeping cannot be understated. In order to reap the benefits of tax relief on charitable giving, it is essential to keep detailed, up-to-date records of all your donations to charity to make sure that you claim the correct amount of tax relief and pay the right amount of tax.

For every tax year, you should keep the following records:

Details of Gift Aid donations showing the date, the amount and the charities involved;

Legal documents showing the sale or transfer of assets to charity - including share transfer documents or certificates or land transfer documents;

Any documentation from a charity asking you to sell land or shares on its behalf

Find out more about keeping records of your gifts to charity

All of the Giving What We Can charities are eligible for Gift Aid if you make a donation via the 

. Additionally, if you require further information on tax-efficient giving and exactly what you or your chosen charity are eligible for, you can contact the 

Stephanie Crampin

Struggle for survival

On the 16th July in London, Giving What We Can will be co-hosting an event "Struggle for Survival" with 

. This is a chance for interested people to experience a little of what it's like to experience some of the challenges faced, and choices made by those living in extreme poverty. The event has been put on at the World Economic Forum, with the aim of getting businesses to get them to do more for the communities where they are based.

. One of our members, Jacob Williamson has attended the last such event we put on, and to give you an idea of what it's like, here is his recollection of what happened:

"I took part in a poverty simulation event organised by Global Hand this evening. I think the offer reached my inbox through the Giving What We Can mailing list, and little detail was given in advance other than beaming endorsements from Ban Ki-Moon and Richard Branson. It seems these folks shook up Davos slightly by attempting to demonstrate to millionaires how the Bottom Billion get by.

"There are, of course, inevitable limits to the realism any such project could achieve. It certainly seems a stretch to think people will immediately imagine anything resembling despair or degradation – nevermind hunger – when the tasks at hand are made into practical, competitive games. It seems to me that the project is instead still promising for different reasons. It is plausible that by learning the facts about the obscenely scarce economic conditions so many people must operate in by playing them out first-hand, people will process and appreciate them more.

"There just is a real sense in which when we’re supplied with photos of people living this in a certain lifestyle and struggling to achieve certain goals, actually proceeding to simulate such goals and actions yourelf, and see how little they go to succeeding in the context of the game – that does bring things to life in a way simply reading such facts might not. So the groundwork for achieving empathy later might be laid, rather than that emotion actually arriving in the course of the experience.

"Supplement it with sufficient information of the kind Giving What We Can tends to provide, not only about how comparatively rich we all are, but also just how much good as individuals we can do, and there could be potential for persuasion there."

A first glance at Development Media International

The literature on economic development has begun to study the potential for mass media in development (Roy, 2014). Information can support citizens to make more informed decisions in many areas of their lives, including health and politics. However, research shows that changing attitudes and knowledge does not necessarily translate into the desired behaviour changes (Nag, 2011). Any successful development media campaign will need to overcome barriers to impact, such as a failure to understand the underlying reasons for existing practices.

 is attempting to realise the potential of mass media to 

 in useful ways in the developing world. DMI is a UK-based NGO that delivers radio and TV campaigns in the developing world (see more 

, with plans to reach 10 African countries. DMI’s current focus is reducing child mortality and morbidity in children under five. The reason for this focus is that the majority of child deaths in this age bracket are the result of a lack of basic practices such as early breastfeeding or diarrhoeal treatment.

In conjunction with the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM), DMI is the first organisation to combine mass media campaigns with scientific modelling to predict health outcomes. Initial estimates from such modelling predict a potential 10-16% reduction in child mortality, at an estimated cost of $60-$300 per life saved, potentially making this the most effective lifesaving intervention available. According to the 

, 6.9 million children under 5 perish each year as a result of the issues DMI is addressing. Assuming a high coverage rate, and given the estimated cost-effectiveness of this project, DMI’s potential annual impact on child mortality is striking. Of course we should be cautious about such estimates, but they do justify further investigation.

DMI has designed its campaigns to address 3 key main aims concerned with:

Behaviour change to save the most lives in a given country and context;

Tackling key barriers such as cultural norms and religious beliefs that commonly impede behavioural change;

Reaching the largest number of people in the most effective way based on carefully selected media partnerships, demographic profiles, geographical locations and language preferences of their target audience at the most effective times of day over a sustained period.

Whilst child survival remains the main focus of DMI, DMI is also targeting a range of other related 

 issues such as sexual and reproductive health, nutrition, hygiene, environmental health and both communicable and non-communicable diseases. This puts them in a good position to make an impact on four of the eight Millennium Development Goals, improving gender equality, child survival, maternal health, and HIV/Aids and malaria.

 frequently attributed to existing studies in development media by conducting a randomised controlled trial of one of their radio health projects in Burkina Faso to evidence their impact. They have attracted the attention of GiveWell, who have described the preliminary results from their trial 

. Although preliminary midline results from a randomized controlled trial appear promising, GiveWell expects to conduct a more thorough evaluation of DMI this year, and will withhold judgement until this is complete.

Using research gathered, DMI have found that their target audiences are most likely to have access to and actively listen to the radio as opposed to the television. In Uganda, as many as 74% of the population listen to the radio at least weekly, compared with only 11% watching television in the same period. Audiences are most receptive to emotionally evocative stories rooted in everyday life delivered in a narrative form. Using a 3-part dramatic structure delivered in the local language, DMI uses the power and perseveration of emotional responses on memory to enact behaviour change in its audience. This 3-part structure lends itself to the intentions of behaviour change, as the dramatic character is forced to overcome an obstacle through behaviour change before he/she can achieve resolution.

The countries chosen for DMI’s current campaigns have been designed to achieve maximum efficacy, by combining those countries with high maternal and child mortality rates that also stand to benefit most from mass media intervention due to average to high media penetration. 

 is implemented “at three levels: in households, in the wider community, and in people’s use of health facilities and services”.

The versatility of DMI’s story development enables multiple interconnected health issues to be addressed, leading to improved health outcomes not necessarily restricted to any one domain. For example, campaigns centred around child health can also serve to reduce neonatal mortality, maternal health, hygiene and nutrition via the promotion of health facilities to give birth or monitor pregnancy. Rather than diluting the focus of a given intervention, evidence suggests that there is only a small reduction of impact on each issue, and because adding another issue to an existing campaign only fractionally increases the cost, the cost-effectiveness is much greater.

In conclusion, a preliminary examination of DMI shows promising results in the development and delivery of mass media public health interventions towards reducing child mortality, morbidity and maternal health via an extremely cost effective medium. It remains to be seen whether the initial results of DMI’s study are statistically significant at closer examination, as the self-reported nature of the initial assessment has raised 

 concern. Development Media International aims to address these concerns in their later endline study results, which will specifically measure child mortality statistics as opposed to subjective self reports. You can expect a later blog post from us reporting on these findings, but so far we are excited by the efforts of DMI in targeting hard-to-reach audiences in a cost-effective way, as well as their unique potential to effect behaviour change on a population level.

If mass media interventions prove socially desirable merit goods in the development process, then a strong case should be made for their wide diffusion among the populace in order to reach the most technologically alienated audiences (Nag, 2011). If they are to act as tools of social inclusion, economic opportunity and empowerment, targeted efforts need to be made to provide access to content, opportunities and tools geared towards the priority needs of a given community. On a broader level, both governmental and non governmental organisations should form a collaborative effort towards the provision of technology to safeguard against the marginalisation of traditionally excluded and disadvantaged groups from effective public health campaigns, such as those employed by DMI (Nag, 2011).

Nag, B. (2011). Mass Media and ICT in Development Communication: Comparison & Convergence. 

Roy, S. (2011). Media Development and Political Stability: An Analysis of Sub-Saharan Africa. 

. MediaMapResource. org (Accessed May 25, 2014).

Katja Grace

Apples and oranges? Some initial thoughts on comparing diverse benefits

An important part of effective altruism is comparing the value of different altruistic endeavours. Many altruistic endeavours bring about different kinds of good things, for instance protection of children from incapacitating diseases, and extra years of quality education. To find the best causes, we need some way of evaluating these next to one another. How much extra education in the developing world is worth the same as an extra year of healthy life?

Answering such questions is notoriously tricky, and Giving What We Can faces an even harder problem of answering them in such a way that other people are happy to use our judgements, and thus our recommendations. One can't just opt out of answering them, for the same reason one 

 choose one’s partner by their social security number just because it's hard to weigh up a good sense of humour against kind eyes.

So how can we make such evaluations? Giving What We Can research has been looking into it a bit, and this blog post will tell you some of what we think. We’ll look at various methods from economics and the social sciences, and discuss the advantages and disadvantages of different approaches.

Any attempt to compare the value of two things has two basic parts. The first step is often to parcel out all of the main ways each item might have benefits. For instance, if a person in Malawi doesn’t contract malaria next year, this will translate to various good things: less suffering and more joy for that person, less stress for their family, less congestion at the local hospital, a few thousand dollars of productive work, slightly different expectations among people nearby about how well their lives are likely to go.

This can go on for more steps - a few thousand dollars of productive work might be factored out in terms of increased prosperity for the family, and more prosperity spread among the wider world. Prosperity for the family might in turn be factored out as better nutrition for them, more education for their children, some investments that will bring them further prosperity, etc.

Another thing that often happens at this stage is that items are made more abstract. For instance one particular girl’s recovery from schistosomiasis might be equated to some number of ‘quality adjusted life years’ or ‘QALYs’. This makes evaluation more tractable. Now we can evaluate many similar things at once, a little bit inaccurately, instead of doing thousands of different evaluations. For instance if we convert many different health interventions into QALYs saved, then we can compare a QALY to a year of school, and we automatically have a comparison of lots of different health interventions.

The second step is to actually compare the value of the items you end up with. This might involve for instance seeing how money much a person is willing to pay to avoid some suffering. You could do this by observing how much money and effort they invest in avoiding the flu, in flu season. Or you might ask them directly, ‘if you could pay $1000 to avoid this surgery, would you take that offer?’. Or instead of looking at money they will sacrifice, you might just ask about how they feel. For instance you might ask a blind person repeatedly over a period how satisfied they are with their life, and do the same with a person who is not blind.

Comparing value can be done immediately without the previous step of converting things, or after so many iterations of the previous step as to turn health and education into unrecognizable buckets of value. Many ways of comparing the value of A against B have been developed, especially in the social sciences. I have collected some of them into a 

, which describes their upsides and downsides, and suggests when we might expect them to be most appropriate.

Note that the methods in the menu are generally comparing benefits to identifiable groups of people. We may care about people for whom it’s hard to make these measurements, such as future generations, but we’ll need different or further methodology to know how to compare these effects to the direct benefits we can measure. Nonetheless it’s valuable to understand how we should compare diverse benefits today, and this may be a key component in a more general analysis.

Blog

How do the extremely poor live?

Tax efficient giving: A guide for UK donors

Struggle for survival

A first glance at Development Media International

Apples and oranges? Some initial thoughts on comparing diverse benefits

The Failures of Foreign Aid (and some potential solutions) Part 2

Giving What We Can in 2014

Toby Ord and DCP3

What Live Below the Line did to Ben Clifford

Live Below the Line