Giving the Microsoft way
We’re in the middle of hte Giving campaign at work. This is the time of
year when we traditionally dig deep and hopefully wind up improving our
communities or at least help the non-profits scrape by for the near term
future. Fundamentally, we’ve always been encouraged to donate to the United
Way of King County and this has always frustrated me. Not because the
United Way in general isn’t a good institution or because there’s anything
wrong with the King County arm in particular (everything I know about the
local organization says they run one of the tighest ships and have
extremely low overhead). But it just seems like capitalism’s answer to the
need for a “social consciousness” product. If you want to “give money” to
“do good”, the United Way is there to take it for you.
I’ve changed my recipient organizations a little over the years, but this
year I’m basically renewing my pledges to
Washington, Federation of American
Scientists, FAIR,