The Secret Sauce of Giving Multiplier: Incentivizing Charitable Giving

We’re coming upon the season of giving — the period when Americans’ generosity pours forth. According to Charity Engine, about one-third of the $590 billion given to charity each year occurs in December.

In this episode, Crows Feet explores an innovative charitable giving platform, Giving Multiplier. 

It combines heartfelt, personal donations with making it far easier to have an impact on some of the world’s most pressing issues: global health and poverty, animal welfare, and climate change.

The Giving Multiplier concept of “bundling donations” emerged from charitable giving research at Harvard University by Dr. Joshua Greene and Dr. Lucius Caviola. They found people were incentivized to give when they could combine their personal interests with global concerns.

Giving Multiplier adds to your gifts to both the local and global charities by up to 25% (30% for Crow’s Feet listeners), depending on the allocation. 

Listen to this interactive episode, then return to it on your laptop to follow along with the tutorial. It can be found at 8 minutes in. 

Links and further information: 

www.givingmultiplier.org/CROW

For more information about Dr. Joshua Greene and Dr. Lucius Caviola

If you’d like to inquire about supporting Giving Multiplier, please contact Matt Coleman, at matt@givingmultiplier.org

And check out the insightful daily perspective by Crows Feet writers at www.crowsfeetlifeasweage.com.

Transcript

Hi, I'm Jane Trombley, your host for today's episode. We're approaching Thanksgiving, (0:06) the national holiday of gratitude, the kickoff of what is known as the giving season. GivingUSA (0:14) reports that U.S. charitable giving topped $590 billion, that's with a B, in 2024, (0:23) with baby boomers responsible for 43% of all charitable donations.We Americans are a generous (0:30) people. 

Open: This is Crow's Feet, a place where we ponder the question, are these our golden years, (0:37) or does aging just suck? Well, yes, getting older is not for the faint-hearted, (0:43) but aging also brings wisdom and humor, a finely tuned perspective on life. (0:49) In our podcast, you'll meet writers and others rethinking our later years, (0:54) people who inspire us to reimagine our future.

Jane: As a baby boomer myself, I know many of us want (1:04) to give back and feel good about the impact our dollars make. At Crow's Feet, we found a resource (1:10) that can enhance your giving. It's called Giving Multiplier, and as the name implies, it adds an (1:16) oomph to your charitable donations.It supports a cause you care about and introduces you to (1:23) impactful ways to address a dire global problem you might not even be aware of. You'll find (1:29) Giving Multiplier on the web at www.givingmultiplier.org. We'll reference that web (1:38) address later in the episode and list it in the show notes. I spoke with Matt Coleman, (1:44) Executive Director of Giving Multiplier, about how this boost to charitable giving works (1:49) and why it is so effective.

First of all, Matt, you guys have a really unique methodology born (1:57) out of behavioral science. Can you speak to the origin of Giving Multiplier a bit as we get into (2:04) it? 

Matt: So Giving Multiplier was created in the psychology department at Harvard University (2:08) by Professor Joshua Green and Professor Lucius Caviola, who's now an assistant professor at the (2:15) University of Cambridge in the UK. They were interested in inspiring people to support (2:20) highly effective charities.They found that when you ask people to simply air your donations between (2:27) your personal favorite nonprofit and an extra recommended one, that people tended to really (2:33) like this and chose this split option much more. And so they got excited about this as a tool (2:38) for potentially introducing people to highly effective charities and ultimately created (2:43) Giving Multiplier as part of this research project. It's its own 501c3, so it's its own (2:48) charity, correct? It's not its own 501c3.So we use Every.org as our fantastic donation (2:54) disbursement partner that handles all of the disbursements. 

Jane: This whole idea of Giving Multiplier, (3:00) a big part of it is how it multiplies a gift. How does that differ from Charity Navigator or (3:08) GuideStar or Giving Alliance or something and says, well, this is a really good charity? 

Matt: (3:14) At Giving Multiplier, we are not charity evaluators ourselves, which is important to say.(3:18) We're guided by the mission of making charitable giving as impactful as possible. And we sort of (3:23) subscribe to a framework when thinking about how to do the most good you can with your charitable (3:28) dollar with sort of a three-pronged approach, which is that we say we want to address problems (3:33) that are big in scale, not too controversial, that it's solvable or tractable, meaning there (3:38) are meaningful ways in which you can actually address the problem. And the third is that these (3:43) problems tend to be overlooked or relatively neglected.And so we rely on experts within (3:48) the cause areas that meet the criteria that I mentioned, this big, solvable and neglected. (3:53) And so we rely on experts at GiveWell, which focus on finding the most cost-effective giving (3:58) opportunities in global health, Animal Charity Evaluators, which does this for animal welfare, (4:03) and Founders Pledge, which look at how to protect against large-scale potential risks like climate (4:08) change and pandemics. So the magnitude of difference between supporting a typical non-profit and one (4:15) that's endorsed by experts like those that I've talked about earlier is really, really huge, (4:20) which means that we have this just enormous superpower, so to speak, to help others at a (4:26) relatively little cost to ourselves. What we do here is we allow donors to support any U.S. (4:31) registered non-profit, so any charity that's personally meaningful to them, that speaks (4:35) to their heart. Then we provide a select list of just 10 non-profits, and you choose one of those (4:41) 10. So now you've chosen your favorite or a charity personally meaningful to you.You've (4:45) one of ours that's recommended by experts. Then you divide your donation between the two (4:50) in whatever increments you like. So you have to give at least 10% to one of our recommended (4:54) charities.And then we add matching funds on top to both donations to sort of incentivize this (4:59) heart and head giving, we like to say, where you're both getting that warm glow that you might feel (5:05) from supporting causes that mean a lot to you that are personally relevant, while also feeling (5:09) confident that your donation is making a huge impact based on expert recommendations. There (5:14) are over 1.8 million U.S. registered non-profits alone. So none of us has the time to vet all of (5:21) them or even a tiny fraction of them and see where a dollar can do the most good.So I think it's (5:25) both efficient use of time and also worthwhile to trust experts and lean on their recommendations. (5:31) But our goal here is really just to get people thinking about how they can do the most good (5:34) with their charitable dollar. 

Jane: Okay, so a minimum of 10% of, say, your $100 donation or whatever your (5:41) pot is, a minimum of 10% has got to go to the charities you recommend, but 90% can go to the (5:49) charity of your choice.

Matt: Yes. 

Jane: Okay. 

Matt: You know, the problem that we think we're addressing is that (5:55) people often don't feel as much of a personal connection to the highly effective charities that (6:00) experts identify, and often because they're addressing problems they've never heard of or (6:03) just don't personally resonate with them.Of course, we have this superpower in the modern (6:08) world, at least in high-income countries, where we can push a few buttons from the comfort of our (6:12) own couch and help others not just close to us, but also thousands of miles away, strangers that (6:17) we'll never meet. And so we think we're resolving this heart versus head dilemma where donors do (6:23) want to both support causes that might be local to them or otherwise personally meaningful, (6:28) but also satisfy that motivation of wanting their hard-earned charitable dollar to go as (6:33) far as possible. And so our platform incentivizes a way of doing both of these things.

Jane: Okay. And I (6:39) want to put $90 of my $100 into the American Red Cross, and then you're going to then give me (6:45) a range of charities that support the same type of causes that the American Red Cross supports, (6:52) but does it maybe in a more effective way or a different way? 

Matt: We have 10 non-profits that span (6:58) global health and development, animal welfare, and global catastrophic risk reduction are sort (7:04) of the three main cause areas we're focused on, and you could choose any of those 10. So let's (7:08) say you choose the American Red Cross.That's great. And then you look on our website and you (7:13) see one of our 10, and maybe one of them speaks to you, and you click on that and you see a little (7:17) description. And then after that, once you type in the donation amount, you said $100, you can (7:22) then use our nifty little slider scale to allocate proportionally how you want to divide your donation (7:27) between the two.

Jane: So an aside to listeners here, Giving Multiplier has very kindly provided a URL (7:36) especially for you, and it's this, givingmultiplier.org forward slash crow. We'll put this (7:45) in the show notes and the time code for the explanation that follows if you want to revisit (7:50) this portion of the episode later. On the Giving Multiplier website, you'll see an introduction (7:56) YouTube video and a note that Giving Multiplier is offering a higher matching rate to Crow's Feet (8:03) listeners.Scroll down and you'll see the make a donation page. First, search on the drop down for (8:11) your charity of choice. It can be very local as long as it's a tax-free 501c3 organization.(8:20) Crow's Feet Life As We Age is included on the list. Second, you'll select from one of Giving Multiplier's (8:28) super effective charities. The green boxes will link you to more details about the charity's (8:34) effectiveness.Third, as Matt said, play with the sliders that allocate funds to adjust how you want (8:41) to split your donation. While the website allows only two donations, one of your choice and one (8:48) of Giving Multiplier's, you can return to the site as often as you wish. Note that Giving Multiplier (8:55) is kicking in an extra 5% to Crow's Feet donors using the Crow code.You can test different (9:03) giving ratios between your charity and the recommended one. Now, back to our conversation (9:09) with Matt. 

Okay, Matt, what if as a donor, I would like to donate to the Giving Multiplier itself? (9:20) How can I do that? 

Matt: There are two ways to do this, and I'm glad you bring this up.(9:24) One is that we often just have people who really like what we're doing, who want to support us (9:28) regularly, and they can just support our matching fund directly. You can go to givingmultiplier.org (9:32) slash matching. You can set up a one-time or monthly matching donation.And this is sort of (9:37) the fuel that powers our system, this virtuous circle of giving, we like to say, where we (9:42) utilize these matching funds to boost people's donations and encourage them to support super (9:46) effective charities. And then in doing so, it creates a demand for even more matching funds (9:51) and so on. The second way to do it is that once you process your donation, if you don't really (9:57) care in particular which super effective charity you support, but you like what we're doing, (10:01) there's actually an option to give it back into the matching fund.So we launched in November 2020, (10:07) and our matching funds have been entirely self-sustaining. That is, individual donors (10:11) have provided enough into the matching fund to keep us going to be able to continue supporting (10:16) more and more new donors. And I'm happy to say we now are just passing the $5 million mark in (10:21) total donations from about 5,000 unique donors.

Jane: And in the very happy event that you would have (10:27) excess funds after a giving period where you kind of reset the clock and start over. 

Matt: (10:34) I'm glad you brought this up because it's an important point, which is that we don't want (10:38) matching funds just sitting around being unused. Our policy is that if matching funds are unused (10:42) after 12 months, they're automatically donated to our super effective charities.Essentially, (10:47) if you support the matching fund, your funds will never sit there indefinitely. They will always (10:52) eventually go towards our recommended charities, at least in part. That's great to know because no (10:56) one ever wants to think that their donation is just lying fallow.

Jane: Is there anything you'd like (11:01) to add that we didn't cover? 

Matt: Yeah. So one thing I didn't get to mention earlier is just about (11:06) charity effectiveness in general and how most people tend to think about it. So one angle around (11:11) is that people often rely on what's called overhead ratio as sort of a proxy or measure (11:17) of charity's effectiveness.That is, it's understandable that donors want as much of (11:22) their hard-earned dollar that they're giving to go to the recipients themselves rather than to (11:27) the organization to fund salaries, infrastructure, marketing, and so on. But actually, the overhead (11:34) ratio or the percent of charitable dollars that go to recipients is often not a great indicator (11:39) of the charity's cost effectiveness. Just like we understand that businesses need to spend money to (11:44) make money, so do amazing nonprofits.Instead, I think what should be utilized more are the outcomes (11:51) themselves. That is, how many individuals are you helping and to what degree? So for example, (11:57) another one of our super effective charities, the Against Malaria Foundation, addresses malaria (12:02) mostly in sub-Saharan Africa, which most people don't know leads to 600,000 deaths per year, (12:08) the majority of those being women and children. And it's completely preventable.And the Against (12:14) Malaria Foundation addresses this by providing insecticide-treated bed nets for about $5 that (12:20) protects two to three people for a couple of years from malaria infections. And so what we care about (12:25) here is not what percentage of the $5 is used for the nonprofit to operate and to scale and to be (12:32) able to operate very well. And additionally, what we care about is the outcomes themselves.So of (12:37) course, these top charities are efficient, but what's more important is what does my dollar (12:42) actually do? And in this case, nearly $5 can buy a bed net to protect, like I said, a couple of (12:47) people from malaria, which is just astoundingly inexpensive and an amazing opportunity. (12:52) The other thing I wanted to mention was that many older donors already give the cause they (12:56) care about. Maybe they've been giving for plenty of years.And I just want to be clear that our (13:00) approach doesn't ask you to change that. We're not asking anyone to give up the causes that (13:05) matter most to you. In fact, quite the contrary. Giving Multiplier is meant to be a friendly, (13:10) we say, yes and approach to giving that affirms your existing values and celebrates the causes that (13:15) you already know and love and support, while inviting you to also support highly cost-effective, (13:21) highly impactful nonprofits that experts recommend as doing a tremendous amount of good per dollar. (13:25) And it can help older donors to create a legacy that aligns not just with personal needing, (13:30) that too, but also doing as much good as possible in a way that's backed by experts. (13:34) 

Jane: And I think also in this time where there have been significant policy changes to the way the (13:41) U.S. distributes aid around the world, your organization that's focusing on some global (13:47) health problems is particularly timely.

Matt: Thank you. Yeah, I appreciate that. 

Jane: (13:52) Matt, I can't thank you enough for this interview and taking me through it.I'm (13:55) going to suggest to the listeners that they open the site and it's givingmultiplier.org (14:01) forward slash pros, because it'll make a whole lot more sense if they're looking at it rather (14:06) than just listening to our discussion of it. 

Matt: Yeah, I do think part of the magic of the platform (14:12) is seeing it for yourself. And I think the user experience is pretty friendly and intuitive and (14:18) interesting.So I recommend people just trying it out, givingmultiplier.org forward slash pro. (14:23) And for anyone considering making a major donation or interested in supporting our (14:27) matching system, please feel free to send me an email at matt at givingmultiplier.org. (14:31) I'd be happy to chat with you again as we gear up for giving season. (14:35) 

Jane: Thank you.I hope your email inbox is full. 

Matt: I hope so too. I'm sure it will be.(14:42) 

Jane: You know, giving to charity feels good any time of year. It releases chemicals that (14:48) activate the brain's reward system. It counters stress by lowering cortisol levels.(14:53) Giving also boosts a sense of purpose and connection, (14:57) supporting better physical and mental health. (15:02) We hope you found this information about giving multiplier helpful. (15:06) Our next episode on December 10th, we'll look at the dark side of giving, (15:11) senior scams, what to watch out for and how to avoid being taken in.(15:19) Thanks for joining us on this episode of Crow's Feet Life As We Age produced by me, (15:25) Jane Trombley, with a lot of help and support from senior editor and founder Nancy Peckinham, (15:32) our sound guy, Rich Halton, our public relations and marketing expert, Nancy Franklin, (15:38) and podcast team members, Betsy Allen, Jean Phil Dyson, Lee J. Bench, and Melinda Blau. (15:49) 

Closing: Thanks for listening to this episode of Crow's Feet Life As We Age. In addition to our podcast, (15:56) we also publish personal essays from hundreds of writers that will inspire you to age with grace, (16:03) grit, wit, and wisdom.Find us on medium.com or on Substack. (16:08) Just search for Crow's Feet Life As We Age. So until next time, remember to savor every moment.(16:16) As Henry Ford said, anyone who stops learning is old, whether at 20 or 80. (16:21) Anyone who keeps learning stays young.