So why don’t companies just cut out the middle man, I wonder, and let employees have $x.xx withheld from their paychecks which is then sent directly to the charity? It would seem a relatively simple thing- the money goes into a special account that is then divvied up and dispersed at regularly scheduled intervals.
Because it’s not REALLY about the charity anymore. It’s about (as I’ve described it before) a corporate dick-measuring contest, with the percentage of participation substituting for dimensional endowment. They’re not doing it so much to help the poor or sick as to make themselves look really good to each other.
Because that would make sense! And then the big-wigs couldn’t swan around peacocking their awards. I always dreaded UW time at my old office. The new one has its own charity, and you get a pretty low-key push during your initial training, quarterly newsletters about what they’re doing, and that’s pretty much it.
I’m randomly amused by the avian metaphorical mishmash of this sentence. 
The Cincinnati local United Way can bite my non-profit ass. They decided that my 501©3 organization, approved by the government as acceptable for tax-exempt status and therefore probably not raping baby seals, was just far too “controversial” for their poor, delicate constitutions. Why? Because we’re… shhh… “the gays”! I work for a group of people who devote vast chunks of their VOLUNTEER hours to work with schools in confronting bullying of all sorts, very much inclusive of bullying based on the perception of being gay or gender nonconforming.
Yes. We think that Jimmy getting his head pounded into a locker cuz he “obviously a queer, dude, just look at how he walks” is a bad thing, but we were politely asked not to apply again. We actually do exist for the children, but they’re afraid we’d offend their corporate clients.
Any organization with that kind of mindset is not one I’m planning to love on.
Things have actually improved at my company. Since they went to e-giving, we no longer have the threatening envelopes handed out by a VP directly to you, while they wait there tapping their foot for you to get your checkbook. In fact, due to the horrendous spam filters we have, I’ve overheard many people who wanted to give to UW (honestly) claim they “never got the e-mail.” I can believe it; through no action on my own and using the default filters, the UW stuff goes into my Junk E-mail folder.
Also, I think my company is a bit cowed. Last year we had a record low turnout - instead of our usual 70+% contribution rate, we had about 30% contribute only 50% of our financial goal. Yet somehow, magically, we hit 100% of our goal only 24 hours later. :dubious: Meaning, the company paid in the rest.
So UW hawking has definitely improved where I work, to the point where it’s no more irritating then occasional spam.
That actually would be very complicated. They’d have to do some research and data entry for every charity the employee wanted to contribute to – they’d have to get a company name, address, phone number, address to send the checks to, their IRS tax exempt number (if there is one), and I dunno what else. At the end of the tax year, they would probably have a whole bunch more hoop-jumping to do to provide tax info to employees and the IRS to be sure that people got their correct taxt deduction. A fairly big company might havev to do this for hundreds or thousands of charities. The UW system is enormously convenient from an employer’s perspective in that all that has to be done just once – then it’s just a matter of plugging in a paycheck donation amount next to each employee name. Pretty much everything else is an unchanging constant.
And THEN you have the issue of company checks being sent to “controversial” or “weird” charities. Some people would designate their money be sent to the NRA, some to the Brady-bill people. Some to NORML, some to NAMBLA, some to “Nazis for Christ”, and who knows what else.
And then maybe “Nazis for Christ” trumpet the fact that the Chicago Police, or IBM, or whatever company, has contributed to their cause. Management would have a fit.
So this is also partly about a kind of money laundering. UW screens the charities that get the money, and is potentially a cut-out to separate the company from the charity to save the former from possible embarrassment. But then of course, the UW has its OWN embarrassment issues, so they have a strong incentive to keep controversial or weird charities off their support list.
Meanwhile, back at the employer, you’ll have some people saying, “How dare you not allow me to designate Nazis for Christ for my giving this year – you charity Nazi! Becky was able to donate to Baptists for Bombing Muslims – why are they any better?”
No – employers collecting for any charity the employees want opens up all kinds of cans of worms. That’s why it’s best that charity remains a private act.
FWIW, IBM offers the option to donate to UW, or directly to any one of thousands of charities already on their list, or to add a new charity to their list to donate to. So they can’t be too concerned about the PR risk.
… You know, before I even opened that other thread, I thought to myself “Mmm. Who would be willing to support something as universally reviled as the United Way.”
Then I thought “I bet it’s Lissa”
Then I bought myself a chocolate with my winnings that I won from myself.
Yeah, like I said, it sounds like a government.
I’m not seeing these two things as mutually exclusive…
I hope you’ve contacted every local media outlet you can think of to advise them of this situation. “United Way denies funds to battered children” is a hell of a headline.
The UW here recently stated that they will streamline operations in order to reign in costs, which most people here presume to mean they plan to distribute money only to the larger charities.
When a corporation that actually supplies a service as an agent for another corporation or individual says, “Pay me 15% of the gross up front, and I will get you more money.” then you know you need a new agent. When a corporation claims to be a charity, and does the same thing, that’s considered unavoidable expenses.
Give what you want to whom you think should get it. That way it’s charity. The the fact that your charity is fifteen percent more effective is just gravy.
Tris
In today’s email from Big-Boss to all employees:
The “this is a worthy cause” thing implies he thinks UW is a halfway home or a children’s hospital rather than something more akin to one of those “convert your coins to cash and we’ll take a percentage” machines (though I have used those machines and don’t resent their 8.5% nearly as much- I know up front they charge it and I’m totally free not to use it).
This is pretty close to what my company does. Except that there are no payroll deductions. I the employee writes a check to the charity of my choice. I then go to the giving website and enter the charity info (The irs charity tax number) and send a copy of the receipt from the charity. The company will match my donation dollar for dollar up to $1000 per year. This is how the company decides to spend a portion of their charity giving. So the Company will donate to any charity that meets some IRS guidelines for deductibility.
Really, that’s a WAY better option than the UW. Not only do you give directly to your choice of charity and avoid the UW overhead bite, you get to leverage extra money for it. I am very impressed.