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> the Red Cross provides almost zero information about how it spends its money. If that is true, how can Charity Navigator rate it 80.5/100? http://www.charit

• avar 11y ago
  I don't know, perhaps they're particularly opaque about Haiti or other "big" disaster relief efforts, or perhaps other charities are just as bad. I'm just summarizing what I took from the article, in particular skip ahead to around 4m50s. The audio is much clearer than the transcript on this issue.
• zabuni 11y ago
  The article basically implies they use exceedingly broad categories, and don't exactly characterize everything the way they should. See also this Propublical article: https://www.propublica.org/article/how-the-red-cross-raised-half-a-billion-dollars-for-haiti-and-built-6-homes https://www.propublica.org/article/how-the-red-cross-raised-... There's a chart half way through that shows, by NPR and Propublica's estimates that instead of 90% spent on actual charity, they only spend 60%. This would tank their rankings in places like Charity Navigator and Givewell. So the short answer to your question, is that they are vague as hell about how they spend the money, and they probably cook the books.
• bitserf 11y ago
  Looks like they're on a CN watchlist, as a result of this reporting. http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=search.news&orgid=3277#.VXGs81JXenM http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=search.news&or...
• shawnee_ 11y ago
  Have a look at RC's "Annual Report" from 2014 ... http://www.redcross.org/images/MEDIA_CustomProductCatalog/m44340081_2014AnnualReport.pdf http://www.redcross.org/images/MEDIA_CustomProductCatalog/m4... This is a fluff piece full of pictures and words. No numbers or financial statements. On page 26 there are a couple pie charts that vaguely outline some general categories of outflows and inflows. No details. If a NYSE company (or even a private company) tried to put out an Annual Report with this kind of glossed-over detail, they...well, they couldn't get away with that. Guidestar.org is not quite as nice, rating it 3 out of 5 stars: http://www.guidestar.org/organizations/53-0196605/american-national-red-cross.aspx#financials http://www.guidestar.org/organizations/53-0196605/american-n... People who run these 'not-for-profit' 501(C)(3) institutions are ironically not held quite as "accountable" as people running normal businesses who have to report to shareholders. In the N4P world, where the "shareholders" are reduced to the general public or generic taxpayers or even to the disaster victims themselves -- it's a lot more difficult to get them to own up accountable to the people they serve. Most of the time the donors are just happy to get their tax write-off and they leave it there.
  • maxerickson 11y ago
    They do publish their financial statements and tax returns, see here: http://www.redcross.org/about-us/publications http://www.redcross.org/about-us/publications This seems to be a common pattern with non profits, to separately issue their financials and annual reports. I'm not sure why.
    • reagency 11y ago
      The report is advertising. They don't want donors to see the financials.
  • bduerst 11y ago
    >This is a fluff piece full of pictures and words That's because it's for benefactors, and not the publicly-available IRS-990 form that details what you're looking for. If you want major financials, you can see them here: http://990s.foundationcenter.org/990_pdf_archive/530/530196605/530196605_201406_990.pdf http://990s.foundationcenter.org/990_pdf_archive/530/5301966... It also gives salaries of the execs too (president makes $550k/yr)