Why Should (Some) of Us Donate?
By: Rosario Notes
Tags: Effective Altruism, Happiness, Charity, Donations, Wellbeing

Donating is a tricky topic. From the efficacy of aid to effective charities, there’s a lot to talk about.

In this post, however, I will not discuss those things. Rather, I want to argue why we should give in the first place and under what conditions it’s imperative to do so.

One reason could be that it feels good. Anyone who has done something generous knows this feeling — it’s warm, and worth doing again. But being selfish can feel just as nice, if not better. Plus selfishness takes less effort. This holds true if we consider how much time privileged people spend volunteering versus going to the mall.

For others, charity can be meaningful. It’s deeper than the pleasure of doing good. The issue with this is that meaning can be subjective. Some people feel that it’s their destiny to be a great athlete. Others think that their calling is to run office. No one has an objective meaning of life, so donating can be meaningful for some, but pointless for others.

An alternative position is that it is our responsibility to help the worse off. A fuzzy feeling to give (or a meaningful thing to do) is not as forceful as the moral consideration of those living in extreme poverty. If we consider that there are millions who die from the lack of earnings, it becomes our responsibility to prevent those deaths.

One might think, why would it be our responsibility if we earned our money? Philosopher Peter Singer treats this question with a thought experiment. If each of us were to see a drowning child in a pond, and we had an expensive outfit on, almost all of us would save the child even if it means getting our clothes wrecked. So, even if we worked towards luxury, would we really prioritize that over saving a drowning child (i.e., someone in extreme poverty)? Of course not.

Problem: Not all of us can afford expensive suits. Many people in developed countries live paycheck-to-paycheck, so this argument ignores income inequality in developed countries. William Macaskill, however, has argued in his book Doing Good Better that anyone who makes at least 40k a year is in the 1% of the global income distribution. Thus, he insists that we should be able to help.

But if we are all supposed to give, regardless of what we make, it would shift developed countries that have tools to generate wealth into not making enough to give (because we would give more than invest). And if we were to accept that “earning to give” is a moral good that we must all achieve, then it would lead that into encouraging everyone to be investment bankers and corporate lawyers, which would do more harm than good. Therefore, holding everyone accountable, regardless of their background, is too demanding and counter-productive.

That said, many of us in developed countries can’t weasel out of the fact that we can save lives through effective charity. The question is who must give and when it is imperative to do so.

Psychologists have collected good data to determine how much money is good enough to be well off. They found that people’s wellbeing improve as they make more, but there’s a cap: 75k. Psychologist Daniel Kahneman and Angus Deaton write in their paper that “… beyond about $75,000/y, there is no improvement whatever in any of the three measures of emotional well-being.”

Kahneman and Deaton (2010)

This means that not all of us needs to donate. Intuitively, this makes sense. Why should the cashier at Walmart donate? They are only making enough to make ends meet.

Yet when we look at people who spend money on luxurious stuff, while knowing that there are people who starve to death or suffer from severe illness, it becomes extremely difficult to justify. Plus, excess doesn’t lead to more personal wellbeing. So at this point it’s just childish and insecure.

The question, thus, isn’t whether why we should donate, but why people who have enough don’t — when they should.