5 ms·

You can affect a lot more people by using your wealth than you can by volunteering your labor, which is probably why people put more value on things they can do

by dcurtis 19y ago

You can affect a lot more people by using your wealth than you can by volunteering your labor, which is probably why people put more value on things they can do with money than things they can do with their labor. I guess most people don't view the reward from volunteering their labor as exceeding the threshold that makes it worth their time. Makes sense to me. I don't think you should call most people jerks just because they don't volunteer. Do you?

daniel-cussen 19y ago
I agree with dcurtis. You can donate money instead of volunteering. If anything, donating an hour's wages is harder than donating an hour's worth of volunteering (assuming your job is not as pleasant as volunteering, which by and large seems to be the case). You might make $20 an hour after adjusting for everything (this gets distorted because of tax deductions and the like), but people have to pay you to do it. You take more pain. While volunteering, you take less pain. Giving an hour of wages might be equivalent to giving two hours of volunteer time (in terms of opportunity cost). If one creates more wealth for the charity than the other, you should do more of that. It might not make sense to volunteer.
mrtron 19y ago
I wish I could find an article I read a long time ago. The general message was that most people give up to early, and that most people do things like give away money too early to people that will waste it. It reminds me to make it to a billion networth before distributing that wealth.
noonespecial 19y ago
Something else to keep in mind: If a lawyer volunteers for an hour serving soup to the homeless his donation should be valued at minimum wage. If he helps set up a trust to stop the corrupt "directors" of the charity from helping themselves to the money both now and in the future, his hour is worth a whole lot more. This is the same for any trained professional. Anyone who has to pause and ask him/herself, "does my insurance cover me if I donate my time doing X" has highly valuable time to donate.
- sammyo 19y ago
  But then you miss the great photo op...
gscott 19y ago
> a lot more people by using your wealth than you can by volunteering your labor My wife volunteers a hour a week at a local school (about 3 miles away) the school has really low state test scores (about 65% lower then our own kid's school state test scores). By volunteering her time she shows something that is worth more then money could ever, that people care. Some money is often needed but you really cannot replace volunteering your own time. You can volunteer your time at what you are good at, not the soup kitchen but some other capacity. With OfficeZilla.com I am able to support charities like MercyShips.com which has 20 gigabytes of files uploaded to the system. Granted they use the materials to seek donations, but if they didn't have 300 volunteers on the ship they would have seek even more donations then they have to do now. So much more in donations they might not be able to continue on.
- curi 19y ago
  How does giving money to support a cause fail to demonstrate that you care about that cause? Even a caring letter of support, would demonstrate caring, but giving money seems to go beyond that in proving you mean it.
  - gscott 19y ago
    Giving money only and not considering volunteering is an issue. Money is great but volunteers make things happen. Sometimes lifes situation doesn't allow a person to volunteer at this time, which happens and is fine but to consider money as better then volunteering I believe is in error. When I was in my early 20's I too thought I should become rich and be able to donate in a big way, maybe enjoy some dinners in my honor for donating so much. Then after working 14+ hour days 6 days a week I found out that working so much was not making me rich and I had done nothing to improve anything not even myself.
    - marvin 19y ago
      I fail to see how volunteering for eight hours helps a charity out better than working for eight hours at what I'm good at and giving away the proceeds. If the charity wants, it can make _any_ guy "volunteer" with the money I gave.

by dcurtis 19y ago

daniel-cussen 19y ago

I agree with dcurtis. You can donate money instead of volunteering. If anything, donating an hour's wages is harder than donating an hour's worth of volunteering (assuming your job is not as pleasant as volunteering, which by and large seems to be the case). You might make $20 an hour after adjusting for everything (this gets distorted because of tax deductions and the like), but people have to pay you to do it. You take more pain. While volunteering, you take less pain. Giving an hour of wages might be equivalent to giving two hours of volunteer time (in terms of opportunity cost). If one creates more wealth for the charity than the other, you should do more of that. It might not make sense to volunteer.

mrtron 19y ago

I wish I could find an article I read a long time ago. The general message was that most people give up to early, and that most people do things like give away money too early to people that will waste it. It reminds me to make it to a billion networth before distributing that wealth.

noonespecial 19y ago

Something else to keep in mind: If a lawyer volunteers for an hour serving soup to the homeless his donation should be valued at minimum wage. If he helps set up a trust to stop the corrupt "directors" of the charity from helping themselves to the money both now and in the future, his hour is worth a whole lot more. This is the same for any trained professional. Anyone who has to pause and ask him/herself, "does my insurance cover me if I donate my time doing X" has highly valuable time to donate.

sammyo 19y ago
But then you miss the great photo op...

gscott 19y ago

> a lot more people by using your wealth than you can by volunteering your labor My wife volunteers a hour a week at a local school (about 3 miles away) the school has really low state test scores (about 65% lower then our own kid's school state test scores). By volunteering her time she shows something that is worth more then money could ever, that people care. Some money is often needed but you really cannot replace volunteering your own time. You can volunteer your time at what you are good at, not the soup kitchen but some other capacity. With OfficeZilla.com I am able to support charities like MercyShips.com which has 20 gigabytes of files uploaded to the system. Granted they use the materials to seek donations, but if they didn't have 300 volunteers on the ship they would have seek even more donations then they have to do now. So much more in donations they might not be able to continue on.

curi 19y ago
How does giving money to support a cause fail to demonstrate that you care about that cause? Even a caring letter of support, would demonstrate caring, but giving money seems to go beyond that in proving you mean it.
- gscott 19y ago
  Giving money only and not considering volunteering is an issue. Money is great but volunteers make things happen. Sometimes lifes situation doesn't allow a person to volunteer at this time, which happens and is fine but to consider money as better then volunteering I believe is in error. When I was in my early 20's I too thought I should become rich and be able to donate in a big way, maybe enjoy some dinners in my honor for donating so much. Then after working 14+ hour days 6 days a week I found out that working so much was not making me rich and I had done nothing to improve anything not even myself.
  - marvin 19y ago
    I fail to see how volunteering for eight hours helps a charity out better than working for eight hours at what I'm good at and giving away the proceeds. If the charity wants, it can make _any_ guy "volunteer" with the money I gave.