As the holiday season and the end of the year rolls around, many of us ramp up our charitable giving, to fulfill altruistic spirits (and, for some, to capture tax breaks before the year closes.)
Every year, my husband and I dutifully choose a few meaningful charities and make contributions. But, in all honesty, the amount that we give every year, while substantial and better than nothing, is still a pretty small percentage of both our total income and wealth. We could still give more without hurting.
I’ve been thinking about this recently because I’ve been reading the book “The Power of Half,” by Kevin Salwen (a former Wall Street Journal editor) and his teenage daughter Hannah Salwen. One day Hannah saw a homeless man in her Atlanta neighborhood at the same time she saw a man driving a gleaming Mercedes. That disparity helped prompt her affluent and already quite altruistic family to do even more. Ultimately, the Salwens ended up selling their huge Atlanta home (complete with elevator!), bought a house half its size and, after careful consideration, donated half of the sale price to The Hunger Project, which helps to end world hunger.
The Salwens acknowledge that few people are “nuts enough” to sell their houses to fund their philanthropy, but their family’s experiment can still be replicated on different scales, regardless of an individual’s wealth or the economic downturn. (On a much bigger scale, for example, at least 40 of America’s wealthiest people, including Bill Gates, Warren Buffett and Michael Bloomberg, have pledged to give away at least half of their fortunes in what is known as the “Giving Pledge.”)
The book suggests thinking in terms of halves, rather than the vague concept of giving “more.” Why half? “Because it’s measurable,” the Salwens write. And you can be creative with the concept of half—not necessarily donating half of your wealth or income or home. To find your own “half,” the Salwens suggest finding something that you may have in excess—be it time, talent, money or stuff. Some suggestions: A teen could give away half of his or her babysitting money, or you could give away half of the proceeds of a garage sale. Or if your family watches six hours of television a week, watch three and volunteer during those other three hours.
What do you think of this concept of half? What could you give half of? Do you have any guiding philanthropic philosophies that you can share?