Do you donate?

I donate what I can to charities that I choose - not ones that ring me up asking. It's tax deductible anyway. I'd rather be giving my money to a good cause than to the tax office.

I have donated cash to INDIVIDUALS,
who do not expect it. That can be fun,
like when I walked past a boy who looked
about 12, playing on a video game console
in a mall, I dropped a $5O bill on the console,
as I went by; that kind of thing.





David

I donate blood. I suspect they get it for free and sell it for $500/pint.

For most of us, itemizing deductions is a sure money loser.

That's a nice way to give, David... I like it.

Knowing your luck, probably!! lol

As to beggars' solicitations in the street, it has depended on my mood.
I have both donated and rejected (mostly rejected).

Once on my way home around 1 AM,
in the Times Square area, I was walking
to a subway. The streets were fairly empty.
On the other side of 8th Ave., a young couple
was walking. A young fellow asked me for
a modest amount of cash for them to get home.
Reflexively, I brushed him off. He returned
to his girl across the street. She condemned him
for his stupidity in having inadequate resources.
Within a few minutes, maybe 20 minutes,
I was feeling very bad for my ungenerosity
and unwillingness to help him out of that
embarrassing situation. I actually returned
to the scene. Of course, thay were gone by then.
I felt guilty, in my mind, sad for my unkindness.

A few years later, in the daytime, I was walking
within about 1/2 a mile of there,
and thay approached me again.
Thay did not remember me.
Their scam was now obvious,
but I gave them several $$ anyway; what the hell.

Wow, I never think of scams, unless it's obvious.

I just googled 'itemizing deductions' to find out what on earth you were talking about. I'm in Australia and we don't have a choice.

One of my favorite forms of donation
has been dropping dimes & quarters
from a passing hot air balloon down
into the grass below, for children nearby;
like an Easter Egg Hunt.

The coins look nice, flashing silver
in the sun, on their way down.





David

You can't take a charitable deduction in the US unless you are itemizing, but many people already itemize since just the interest on a home mortgage and state taxes would put most households over the "standard deduction".

Oh, you don't talk funny so I didn't realize. We get a really generous standard deduction, which we can all take. The intent is to make it so large that we and the Internal Revenue Service don't need to spend hours working on the details.

If you have huge qualified and work related travel expenses, crippling medical expenses, and mortage interest on a home costing over a quarter million, you might come out ahead by itemizing - if your income puts you in a very high tax bracket.

Interest on mortgages for your first home are tax deductable. I'm pretty sure this is not the case in Canada. I have no idea what they do in Australia.

Thanks for the explanations.
No we can't claim mortgage interest here - wish we could!

Yeah, but that and a few other incentives for home ownership had much to do with our rather well known housing boom and bust. Not that non-recourse mortgages had nothing with it.

You can also set up a charitable trust through a bank. The advantages are a substantial tax break and the trust bank does all the leg work in checking out the charity. We've only had one denied - a foundation set up to assist military families on an army base, and I think that was only because they hadn't filed their paperwork properly.

I used to donate money, when I had some. I also used to do volunteer work when I could speak audibly. I tutored ESL.

I enjoyed them both. My financial donations to the NY Zoological Society (da Bronx Zoo) got me in to membership night at the zool. Great fun. And to the annual membership meeting at Lincoln Center--my favorite. I miss that stuff.

I give to food to the food bank. Socks, toques and backpacks and so on to the Youth Emergency Shelter. I give cash to CKUA my favourite non profit radio station and to the Stollery children's hospital. At christmas I give gifts to Santa's Anonymous. I've worked countless bingos and casinos for my kids schools and sports teams and other charities.

I donated a painting to the UCLA med center a bunch of years ago, and the art person set it up in the breast cancer center, which was cool. Subsequently I got invited to a small garden party for donors to see the model for the new med center. (I parked my questionable car down the hill..)

I've always donated clothes and other goods to dedicated thrift shops, still do. Money, not so much, as it has always, for one reason or another, been spare. Once to a political effort.

Yes...my main things are two micro-finance organisations...one specifically for women. I add to these whenever I have some spare money. My understanding is that this is the most effective method for third world assistance.

Otherwise, I give, usually via Red Cross or Oxfam (with Haiti I researched who in hell appeared to be actually on the ground and knew what was needed most and gave via them) whenever there are disasters or famines or what the hell.

In Australia, I have particular organizations whose work I know and respect that I give to whenever I can.

And I give for animals via a few organizations.