Giving Tuesday

Opinion: Giving Tuesday (following Thanksgiving, black Friday, small business Saturday and cyber Monday) might have been a good idea when it began, but it has become annoying. I think I deleted about 35 messages yesterday and threw out some snail mail. Some were from organizations I've already given to, and even though I know these are mass mailings, it irritates me to see begging and manipulating after I've already been generous. I'm of the opinion that, unlike true growth or the expanding economic pie, charitable dollars are probably fixed. We donate about 10 or 12% of our income and have for about 50 years. Our income and interests change (higher when we were employed) but our values haven't. Our cat died in 2017 so we don't contribute now to Cat Welfare. When Project Veritas dumped the founder, it lost our donation. When Pinecrest was taken over by Allure I no longer send a memorial to honor my parents. The money was shifted to Lutheran Bible Translators or Pregnancy Decision Health Center, saving babies from abortion.

Whether you give $5 a year or $5,000, getting an e-mail may move more for this orphanage or that little league team, but it may not change your overall percentage. There are only so many charitable dollars to go around. Does Giving Tuesday make people more charitable?

A few facts:  Now, AFTER I wrote the above paragraph, I actually checked my opinion against the AI fact checkers. I was told that 2012 was the first year with 2500 non-profits and over $12 million given/pledged. Now (2022) it's up to $3.1 billion, an increase of 15% over 2021. So what self-respecting manager of a non-profit wouldn't sign on for what appears to be an increase in gratitude and charity?

So, I ask you, are people more charitable than they were in 2012 or is it a shell game and the money just moves around, with the bigger and better advertisers getting the bigger share using a good gimmick, Giving Tuesday.