Philanthropy is bad (in some ways)

Has Google become the bad guy?

After complaints on privacy, Googlebombing, and now the authors, Google's star is not as shiny as it used to be. In what may be an attempt to revive its faded colors, Google has launched its foundation not long ago: Google.org. The problem is that, with $1 billion, it's underfunded for such a large and successful company. The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has an endowment of $28.8 billion. A quick computing tells me that it's... it's, hum... 28.8 times more than Google. Second, there's barely any information on their homepage. How have the first commitments been decided upon? What about the next ones? Is there any transparency? Do we have reasons to be suspicious of the goals pursued?

Why would I need to know?, would you say, it's their private money after all. First, if they want me to be impressed, they should reassure me that they haven't given their money to their friends to build some race car. Second, this lack of transparency is one of the many problems with philanthropy. Goodwill people give their money, thinking that it will be put at good use, but accountable mechanisms are missing. We're asked to believe in foundations.

Americans are proud of their philanthropic tradition, but I see very little reason why. It's people who have more money than they can spend who decide to buy what can't be bought (you'd think): respect and admiration. But what bothers me the most with philanthropy, is its arbitrariness. People make harsh and too often unjust judgment of who deserves to receive. You have to be a starving and beaten kid to get anything those days (well, if you're a homeless from New Orleans, you'll get second hand clothes). But former prisoners also need money to re-enter society - classes, coaching, financial support, etc. Who do you think would give money to these guys? Nobody - and so they get lost in the cracks of philanthropy. That's why United Way talks very little about who they help - because they don't want to publicize the causes that are unpopular but that do need the money.

And there's the naivete of it. Who do you think receives the money given to philanthropy? Starving kids? Indirectly. It's food companies for providing food, truck companies for selling and renting trucks and so on so forth. This money buys goods and services at market prices. Sure, it's what's need and what should be bought. It just hasn't entered the public mind, who still see their dollar open the sky so that a ray of light touches the face of an orphan girl. Think about it next time you see a Corvette passing by: it may be the manager of a truck company.