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A new year, a new project. :) A couple of weeks ago, I saw a tweet by Kelsey Timmerman about his year of giving away $10 every Tuesday. I’m always intrigued by interesting projects that people undertake. And this one really appealed to me as giving is something I could do a bit more of. Kelsey mentions this NY Times article about Americans earning less than $25,000 give away 4.2% of their income on average and those earning $75,000+ give away only 2.7% of theirs. An interesting comparison of scale, empathy, and income.
So the plan is that every Friday I’ll donate $11 to something. Why $11? 1. I like odd numbers. 2. For 2011. 3. $10 has already been done. :P
I love the idea that after a year of giving I’ll have a pretty good idea of places I would like to donate more too. So this project is a work in progress. And I miraculously did donate $10 on New Year’s Eve, so I’m going to count that as week #1. So some weeks I might be donating to an NGO in Nepal and other weeks I might find a Kickstarter campaign that I really want to support or donate to a local nonprofit. Either way, it’s about creating a habit of giving and learning in the process. :)
Jan 7: PDX Pop Now
Jan 14: Mercy Corps
Jan 21: Next Generation Nepal
It would be awesome if you wanted to join me on my project, even for just one week. So if you end up giving to any of my weekly give picks, let me know! And here’s Kelsey’s follow up post about his Year of Giving.
How I Will Help You Save The World
January 31, 2011 at 4:05 am[…] Friday I came across two things that came to my attention: 1. This post of Powered by Tofu that talks about a Year of Giving (every week she’ll donate $11 to different charity). 2. Our […]
Jill - Jack and Jill Travel The World
January 27, 2011 at 5:48 pmWhat a way to make all of us feel like selfish bastards :p… I’m teasing you…
It’s a wonderful idea, really. Animal welfare is very close to our hearts and we donated supplies just last week to North Star Rescue (check them out if you’d like) that’s handling a big hoarding case of 1000 rats (it was actually featured on A&E Hoarders show). They’re domestic rats, and they’re cute as hell, unlike the stereotype of rats people tend to have…
Anyway, stories like this always make all warm and fuzzy at heart. If you decide to donate to North Star, ping me and I’ll match your donation :)
poweredbytofu
April 27, 2011 at 7:08 pmThis week it is! :)
Jessica
January 27, 2011 at 7:12 amHey, this is a good plan! Something that you can totally handle each week but then that amounts to someting big over a year-cool! And yeah, it’s always interesting to see how people barely above the poverty level give so much more, usually because they understand how much donations actually help because they may have been in a situation where they needed assistance. Wealthy people that have always been wealthy don’t really grasp how little other people have.