UF CAIRES employs a range of instruments for implementing your customized philanthropic program, including: 1) partnerships with existing non-profit organizations that we have documented to be frugal and effective; 2) pilot programs; 3) challenge grants; 4) employing the instrument of Donor-advised Funds to distribute support as needed; and 5) the creation of new charitable organizations specifically targeted to your philanthropic goals.
Studies have demonstrated that when philanthropic resources are deployed without clear-eyed thinking and rigorous interdisciplinary research, the best of intentions often yield very disappointing results. Resources are frequently wasted on ineffective programs. Or worse, poorly designed efforts actually make matters worse.
Navigating the non-profit world is a difficult challenge for individuals. There are over one million non-profit organizations in the US today, and that number is growing by fifty thousand each year. That is not surpising, given that the IRS approves 99.5 of all new applications for 501c3 status, and there is no sunset clause to terminate old or ineffective charities.
In the U.S., a typical non-profit organization spends between $22 and $43 to raise $100 for its programs. Most organizations are more focused on fund-raising than ensuring effectiveness. As Ken Sterns observes “the market incentives of the nonprofit world push charities toward happy anecdote and inspiring narrative rather than toward careful planning, research, and evidence-based investments…. Charities know that they are rewarded not for finding cost-effective solutions to problems—nor solutions to problems at all—but for finding ways to personalize, humanize, and convey needs.”[i]
A careful review of charities’ capacity to produce meaningful, long-term impacts suggests that gross inefficiencies, waste, and failed projects are not uncommon. Few nonprofits even attempt to measure the results of their efforts. All too often, misleading marketing and outright fraud are involved. Much of this fraud involves illegitimate compensation for nonprofit CEOS and doctored results. But some is more egregious. After Hurricane Katrina, the FBI estimated that twenty-four hundred fake websites had been set up to bilk unwitting donors trying to relieve the plight of victims. Fraud within the charitable sector has been estimated to run at $40 billion annually.
Charitable organizations are one of the fastest growing sectors in the US economy, currently accounting for 10 percent of its total activity. And the United States is arguably the most generous country in the world, with its people giving more to charitable organizations than any other. UF CAIRES offers you the opportunity to make your generosity both impactful and secure.
To learn more about how CAIRES can help realize your philanthropic vision click here
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[i]Ken Stern, With Charity for All: Why Charities are Failing and a Better Way to Give (Anchor Books, 2013). See also: Matthew Bishop and Michael Green, Philanthro-capitalism: How the Rich Can Save the World (New York: Bloomsbury Press, 2008); Paul Brest and Hal Harvey, Money Well Spent: A Strategic Plan for Smart Philanthropy (Bloomberg Press, 2015); Dean Karlan and Jacob Appel, More Than Good Intentions: Improving the Ways the World’s Poor Borrow, Save, Farm, Learn, and Stay Healthy (Plume, 2012); Thomas J. Tierney and Joel L. Fleishman, Give Smart: Philanthropy that Gets Results (PublicAffairs, 2011); William Eggers and Paul Macmillan, The Solution Revolution: How Business, Government, and Social Enterprises are Teaming Up to Solve Society’s Toughest Problems (Boston: Harvard Business Review Press, 2013).and Leslie Paul Thiele, Indra’s Net and the Midas Touch: Living Sustainably in a Connected World (MIT Press, 2011).