- Published 28 Dec 2020
2020 has been quite a year. It would be hard to find a single person who's remained unaffected by the turmoil of the pandemic. Our hearts go out to everyone impacted, and we deeply appreciate the support and commitment of this community. Your enthusiasm for making the world a better place is wonderful, touching, and inspiring.
On a positive note, this year we've seen an incredible amount of generosity (our most pledges ever) and seen many good things happening in the world amongst it all (check out the silver linings of 2020 and 99 good news stories from 2020).
As giving season comes to an end and the new year approaches, now is a great time to review the updated giving recommendations and make an end of year donation:
- Giving What We Can (Various Causes)
- Animal Charity Evaluators (Animal Welfare)
- Founders Pledge (Various Causes)
- GiveWell (Global Health & Development)
- Giving Green (Climate Change)
- Open Philanthropy's staff (Various Causes)
For many donors we recommend using a charity regranting fund that allows donors to pool their money together to find outstanding giving opportunities. See our list of charity regranting funds.
As we have conversations with friends and family around giving gifts, and new plans for the new year, it's also a fantastic time to talk about making a commitment to use your income to help others. Check out our Share Our Ideas page for some tips on talking about effective giving.
Now is also a great time to reflect on your giving for 2020 and record your donations in your dashboard (this also helps us track impact).
A lot has been happening over at Giving What We Can, here are the key recent highlights and updates:
- Our co-founder Toby Ord was featured in a Vox article all about Giving What We Can: This man has donated at least 10% of his salary to charity for 11 years running.
- We've been featured in a number of podcasts including Making Sense, Your World, Your Money, Hear This Idea, and Odin Media.
- We recently launched a publication about Effective GIving on Medium.
- Giving What We Can now operates independently of CEA (with ongoing operational support).
We've also published some new posts on our blog:
- How to do the most good with your stimulus check if you don't need it
- The behavioural science of donating to charity: Why we sometimes fail to do the most good we can, and what can be done about it
- Social change happens one person at a time, so start multiplying your impact!
- Member Profile: Alexandra Berlina: "If spending… can improve my life only marginally, and someone else's life considerably… then it makes more sense to spend it on someone else. I couldn't live with myself if I did nothing."
- Member Profile: Pippa Gilbert: "As long as there's that huge inequality, then I am motivated to keep donating a part of my income."
We hope to see you soon at one of our upcoming events in January, including two online Meetups (Jan 9/10) and an Open Forum (Jan 21).
Keep reading below for news & updates from evaluators, grantmakers, incubators, our community, and various cause areas!
Evaluators, Grantmakers, Incubators
- Charity Entrepreneurship applications are open for their 2021 Incubation Program. They also released the results of their survey to find the most promising avenues for new EA meta-charities.
- EA Funds have recent payout reports available for EA Infrastructure Fund, Long-Term Future Fund and the Animal Welfare Fund. The Long-Term Future Fund managers held an 'Ask Us Anything' on the EA Forum.
- Founders Pledge have released an analysis on the implications of Biden's victory on climate change donation recommendations.
- GiveWell have released their report on money moved in 2019.
Community
- Read the latest updates from 28 effective altruism organisations – all the way from 80,000 Hours to Wild Animal Initiative!
- EA Medicine is a new network for people working in healthcare and interested in effective altruism.
- In Sweden the new site geeffektivt.se launched to promote effective giving to a Swedish audience. With zero transaction costs you can support global health, climate and animal welfare charities.
- The talks from Effective Giving Day are now available for streaming on YouTube.
- WANBAM (Women and Non-Binary Altruism Mentorship) is now accepting Expressions of Interest for mentees.
Donating
- This Vox article by Dylan Matthews provides some effective giving recommendations for 2020 (it also recommends pledging to give).
- Giving money away makes us happy. Then why do so few of us do it?
- Giving Tuesday, explained: A short history of Giving Tuesday, the international day for giving back.
- Don't wait: The case for giving sooner rather than later
- Is the pandemic making people more generous — or more selfish? The data on how people are giving in 2020 may surprise you.
- How to do the most good with your stimulus check if you don't need it
Causes
Animal Welfare
- Singapore is the first country to approve a cell-based meat product
- Animal Advocacy Africa (AAA) has launched with a mission to develop a collaborative and effective animal advocacy movement in Africa.
Climate Change
- How affluent people can end their mindless overconsumption. Every energy reduction we can make is a gift to future humans, and all life on Earth.
- Giving Green has been re-launched, a new initiative incubated at IDinsight that aims to guide donations towards evidence backed climate change projects.
- The Founders Pledge Climate Fund has been launched and is open to donations from individuals via EA Funds and every.org, allowing individuals to donate to the highest impact options in the climate space capitalizing on the Biden window.
Global Health & Economic Development
- Vox author Kelsey Piper writes about reading The Life You Can Save during the pandemic: "The world's problems overwhelmed me. This book empowered me."
- HLI have released a systematic review and meta-analysis on the impact of cash transfers on subjective well-being and mental health in low- and middle-income countries .
- Our World in Data explores how pandemics allow us to understand why our ancestors lived in poverty.
- 2021 is shaping up to be "the worst humanitarian crisis year since the beginning of the United Nations" says World Food Programme (WFP) chief David Beasley.
- Good News: There has been a large decline in the number of people with lymphatic filariasis, a neglected tropical disease: from ~200 million people in 2000 to ~50 million people in 2018.
- Good News: Cambodia is closer to eradicating Malaria with a 70% reduction in cases this year compared to last year.
Long-term Future
- "Patient vs urgent longtermism" has little direct bearing on "giving now vs later" says Owen Cotton-Barratt.
- Centre for the Study of Existential Risk released a report on promoting epistemic security in a technologically-advanced world.
- Toby Ord was published in The Economist: The pandemic showed up humanity's vulnerability. It also showed the need to prepare for future risks.
Subjective Well-being
- HLI summarises what philosophers do (and don't) mean by 'well-being' and what the implications are.
Share Our Ideas
A great way to multiply your impact is to simply tell people about effective giving. Here are just a few ways you can help advocate for effective giving:
- Wear a t-shirt (or pin, cap etc) that advocates for effective giving
- Share our recommended videos, books, podcasts, and essays with people you know.
- Share your effective giving story on our blog or externally (e.g. your own blog, a local newspaper, student magazine, professional journal, company newsletter etc).
Useful Links
- Review our giving recommendations
- Report your donations with your pledge dashboard
- Join other members in the Giving What We Can Community Facebook group
- Find more ways to get involved with Giving What We Can and effective altruism
- Discuss effective giving on the EA Forum
For more news and articles, you can follow us on Twitter, Facebook or LinkedIn, or subscribe to the EA Newsletter.
Do you have questions about the pledge, Giving What We Can, or effective altruism in general? Check out our FAQ page, or contact us directly.
This is the online edition of our December 2020 email newsletter (subscribe here).
— Luke Freeman Executive Director of Giving What We Can
Luke Freeman manages Giving What We Can. He is also an active volunteer with various social impact focused projects (EAGxAustralia, Effective Altruism Australia, EA Sydney, Global Shapers Community). He has a background in marketing with a focus on growing early-stage technology startups (Positly, Sendle, TuShare, Coviu). He holds degrees and diplomas in media and communications from Macquarie University and Simon Fraser University.