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Giving What We Can (GWWC) is an effective altruism-associated organisation whose members pledge to give at least 10% of their income to effective charities. It was founded at
Oxford University Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...
in 2009 by the philosopher
Toby Ord Toby David Godfrey Ord (born July 1979) is an Australian philosopher. He founded Giving What We Can in 2009, an international society whose members pledge to donate at least 10% of their income to effective charities, and is a key figure in the ...
, physician-in-training Bernadette Young (Ord's wife), and fellow philosopher
William MacAskill William David MacAskill (; born 24 March 1987) is a Scottish philosopher and author, as well as one of the originators of the effective altruism movement. He is an Associate Professor in Philosophy and Research Fellow at the Global Priorities I ...
.


History

Giving What We Can was founded as a giving society in 2009 by
Toby Ord Toby David Godfrey Ord (born July 1979) is an Australian philosopher. He founded Giving What We Can in 2009, an international society whose members pledge to donate at least 10% of their income to effective charities, and is a key figure in the ...
, an ethics researcher at
Oxford Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...
, his wife Bernadette Young, a physician in training at the time, and fellow ethicist
William MacAskill William David MacAskill (; born 24 March 1987) is a Scottish philosopher and author, as well as one of the originators of the effective altruism movement. He is an Associate Professor in Philosophy and Research Fellow at the Global Priorities I ...
with the goal of encouraging people to give 10% of their income on a regular basis to alleviate world poverty. This is similar to
zakat Zakat ( ar, زكاة; , "that which purifies", also Zakat al-mal , "zakat on wealth", or Zakah) is a form of almsgiving, often collected by the Muslim Ummah. It is considered in Islam as a religious obligation, and by Quranic ranking, is ...
in Islam and '' Ma'aser kesafim'' (giving 10% of income) in Jewish tradition but Ord said there was no religious motivation behind it. Ord cited writings from
Peter Singer Peter Albert David Singer (born 6 July 1946) is an Australian moral philosopher, currently the Ira W. DeCamp Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University. He specialises in applied ethics and approaches ethical issues from a Secularit ...
and
Thomas Pogge Thomas Winfried Menko Pogge (; born 13 August 1953) is a German philosopher and is the Director of the Global Justice Program and Leitner Professor of Philosophy and International Affairs at Yale University. In addition to his Yale appointment, h ...
about one's moral duty to give to the poor as inspiration for starting the organisation, and personally planned to give away everything above about $28,000 a year, the median after-tax salary in the U.K. His focus was on effective giving, meaning that he emphasised donations to charities which saved a maximal amount of life per donation amount. GWWC was launched with 23 members. People who joined signed a pledge to give away 10% of their income to any organisation they thought could best address poverty in the developing world, and could pledge more; there was no penalty for quitting. By the end of 2011 it had 177 members, mostly other academics, in five chapters including
Oxford Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...
,
Cambridge Cambridge ( ) is a university city and the county town in Cambridgeshire, England. It is located on the River Cam approximately north of London. As of the 2021 United Kingdom census, the population of Cambridge was 145,700. Cambridge bec ...
,
Princeton Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the ni ...
, and Harvard. By November 2011, the organisation was providing its members regular reports on what charities were most effective at addressing poverty in the developing world, and at that time was recommending a tropical diseases group and a de-worming group that each worked in Africa. Ord relied in part on research conducted by
GiveWell GiveWell is an American non-profit charity assessment and effective altruism-focused organization. GiveWell focuses primarily on the cost-effectiveness of the organizations that it evaluates, rather than traditional metrics such as the percentag ...
, and also used the concept of the
quality-adjusted life-year The quality-adjusted life year (QALY) is a generic measure of disease burden, including both the quality and the quantity of life lived. It is used in economic evaluation to assess the value of medical interventions. One QALY equates to one year ...
to gauge effectiveness of charities. In 2011, a sister organisation at Oxford lead by MacAskill and others called "High Impact Careers" was spun off from Giving What We Can. This organisation encouraged people to pursue high-paying jobs so they could give more money away. High Impact Careers was soon renamed to
80,000 Hours 80,000 Hours is a London-based nonprofit organisation that conducts research on which careers have the largest positive social impact and provides career advice based on that research. It provides this advice on their website and podcast, and ...
. In 2012 the two organisations incorporated the
Centre for Effective Altruism The Centre for Effective Altruism (CEA) is an Oxford-based charity that builds and supports the effective altruism community. It was founded in 2012 by William MacAskill and Toby Ord, both philosophers at the University of Oxford. CEA is part o ...
as a nonprofit to serve as an umbrella organisation. In 2017, Giving What We Can stopped conducting original research but rather started to recommend to its members to follow the advice by charity evaluators such as GiveWell,
Animal Charity Evaluators Animal Charity Evaluators (ACE), formerly known as Effective Animal Activism (EAA), is a US-based charity evaluator and effective altruism-focused nonprofit founded in 2012. ACE evaluates animal charities and compares the effectiveness of their d ...
and
Founders Pledge Founders Pledge is a London-based charitable initiative, where entrepreneurs commit to donate a portion of their personal proceeds to charity when they sell their business. Inspired by effective altruism, the mission of Founders Pledge is to "em ...
. Additionally, they recommend a list of individual charities that cover a wide range of causes including global
poverty alleviation Poverty reduction, poverty relief, or poverty alleviation, is a set of measures, both economic and humanitarian, that are intended to permanently lift people out of poverty. Measures, like those promoted by Henry George in his economics clas ...
, animal welfare and the welfare of future generations.


Research

Giving What We Can used to conduct research to determine which charities it would recommend for members and other people to support. It differed from other charity evaluators in terms of the importance given to metrics of charity performance. While evaluators such as Charity Navigator used the fraction of donations spent on program expenses versus administrative overhead as an important indicator, Giving What We Can solely focused on the cost-effectiveness of the charity's work. It believed that the variance in cost-effectiveness of charities arose largely due to the variance in the nature of the causes that the charities operate in, and therefore made evaluations across broad areas of work such as health, education, and emergency aid before comparing specific organisations. In practice, it recommended a selected few charities in the area of
global health Global health is the health of the populations in the worldwide context; it has been defined as "the area of study, research and practice that places a priority on improving health and achieving equity in health for all people worldwide". Problem ...
. Its work was therefore similar to that of GiveWell. In 2017, the
Centre for Effective Altruism The Centre for Effective Altruism (CEA) is an Oxford-based charity that builds and supports the effective altruism community. It was founded in 2012 by William MacAskill and Toby Ord, both philosophers at the University of Oxford. CEA is part o ...
stopped conducting original research into giving opportunities based on significant overlap with organisations like GiveWell and the
Open Philanthropy Project Open Philanthropy is a research and grantmaking foundation that makes grants based on the doctrine of effective altruism. It was founded as a partnership between GiveWell and Good Ventures. Its current co-chief executive officers are Holde ...
.


Pledges

The shared ground of all Giving What We Can members is that they have committed to providing at least 10% of their income by signing "The Pledge". Therefore, members often refer to themselves as "pledges".


The Pledge

The pledge is a voluntary and non-legal commitment to donate 10% of one's income. This figure is the minimum percentage and was chosen because it has a good balance. It is a significant proportion of income, in recognition of the importance of the problem and the need for real action. But it is also within the reach of most people in the developed world. Some members decide to go further and commit to donating 20% or even 50%. Some members decide to go even further and perform the "Further Pledge".


The Further Pledge

Founder Toby Ord further pledged to donate anything he earned over £20,000 a year, based on his conviction that he could live comfortably and happily on this income. This level of commitment is called "The Further Pledge". The member defines a basic annual income that they expect to live on. All income above this level will be donated to effective measures. Co-founder Will MacAskill is also among those who have made a similar pledge.


Try Giving

Because some people may be interested in GWWC but not yet ready to take the pledge, it is also possible to make a temporary commitment called "Try Giving". This involves making a commitment to donate at least 1% of one's income for a specified period of time.


Companies

In 2020, GWWC launched the option for companies to also declare their commitment to donating to effective organizations. In this case, companies commit to donate at least 10% of their profits to effective charities.


Members

By 2012 the group had 264 people from 17 countries. It surpassed 1,000 members in 2015 and 5,000 members in 2020.


Prominent members

Since its inception in 2009 the Giving What We Can Pledge was signed by various prominent individuals, mostly academics: *
Sam Bankman-Fried Samuel Benjamin Bankman-Fried (born March 6, 1992), also known by the initialism SBF, is an American suspected fraudster, entrepreneur, investor, and former billionaire. Bankman-Fried was the founder and CEO of the cryptocurrency exchange FTX ...
co-founder of crypto-companies FTX and
Alameda Research Alameda Research was a cryptocurrency trading firm, co-founded in September 2017 by Sam Bankman-Fried and Tara Mac Aulay. In November 2022, FTX, Alameda's sister cryptocurrency exchange, experienced a solvency crisis, and both FTX and Alame ...
*
Aviva Baumann Aviva Baumann ( Farber; born July 10, 1984) is an American actress. She is known for playing Nicola in the comedy film ''Superbad'' (2007), young Shannon Gibbs on the military police procedural series '' NCIS'', and Mandy on the sitcom ''Party D ...
American actress *
Ken Baumann Kenneth Robert Tuff Baumann (born August 8, 1989) is an American actor, writer, publisher and book designer. He became most known for playing Ben Boykewich on ''The Secret Life of the American Teenager''. He is the author of numerous novels, n ...
American actor, writer, publisher and book designer *
Jonathan Blow Jonathan Blow (born 1971) is an American video game designer and programmer. He is best known for his work on the independent video games '' Braid'' (2008) and '' The Witness'' (2016). Born in California, Blow developed a passion for game prog ...
American video game designer, programmer and
Twitch Twitch may refer to: Biology * Muscle contraction ** Convulsion, rapid and repeated muscle contraction and relaxation ** Fasciculation, a small, local, involuntary muscle contraction ** Myoclonic twitch, a jerk usually caused by sudden muscle co ...
streamer *
Liv Boeree Olivia "Liv" Boeree (born 18 July 1984) is a British science communicator, television presenter and former professional poker player. She is a World Series of Poker and European Poker Tour champion, and is the only female player in history to w ...
television presenter and former professional poker player *
John Bohannon John Bohannon is an American science journalist and scientist who is Director of Science at Primer, an artificial intelligence company headquartered in San Francisco, California. He is known for his career prior to Primer as a science journalist a ...
American
science journalist Science journalism conveys reporting about science to the public. The field typically involves interactions between scientists, journalists, and the public. Origins Modern science journalism dates back to '' Digdarshan'' (means showing the d ...
and scientist who is director of science at Primer, an
artificial intelligence Artificial intelligence (AI) is intelligence—perceiving, synthesizing, and inferring information—demonstrated by machines, as opposed to intelligence displayed by animals and humans. Example tasks in which this is done include speech r ...
company *
Rutger Bregman Rutger C. Bregman (born 26 April 1988) is a Dutch historian and author. He has published four books on history, philosophy, and economics, including '' Utopia for Realists: How We Can Build the Ideal World'', which has been translated into thirt ...
Dutch popular historian and author of four books on history, philosophy, and economics, including
Utopia for Realists ''Utopia for Realists: The Case for a Universal Basic Income, Open Borders, and a 15-hour Workweek'' (alternatively subtitled ''And How We Can Get There'' and ''How We Can Build the Ideal World'') is a book by Dutch popular historian Rutger Breg ...
*
Marcus Daniell Marcus Daniell (born 9 November 1989) is a New Zealand professional tennis player. He reached his career-high ATP doubles ranking of world No. 34 on 29 January 2018 after reaching the quarterfinals of the Australian Open. He won a bronze medal ...
Olympic tennis player from New Zealand with 5 ATP titles and founder of the organization High Impact Athletes *
Ben Delo Ben Delo (, born 24 February 1984) is a British entrepreneur. He is a co-founder and former executive of BitMEX. In 2022, Delo pled guilty to breaking United States Bank Secrecy Act violations and received a 30 month probation sentence and $10m ...
British mathematician, computer programmer, and entrepreneur, co-founder of
BitMEX BitMEX is a cryptocurrency exchange and derivative trading platform. It is owned and operated by HDR Global Trading Limited, which is registered in the Seychelles. History BitMEX was founded in 2014 by Arthur Hayes, Ben Delo, and Samuel Reed, ...
* Peter EckersleyAustralian computer scientist, computer security researcher and activist * Nir Eyalprofessor of
bioethics Bioethics is both a field of study and professional practice, interested in ethical issues related to health (primarily focused on the human, but also increasingly includes animal ethics), including those emerging from advances in biology, m ...
and director of the Center for Population–Level Bioethics at
Rutgers University Rutgers University (; RU), officially Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is a Public university, public land-grant research university consisting of four campuses in New Jersey. Chartered in 1766, Rutgers was originally called Queen's ...
* Alan Fenwickprofessor of tropical parasitology at the
Imperial College London Imperial College London (legally Imperial College of Science, Technology and Medicine) is a public research university in London, United Kingdom. Its history began with Prince Albert, consort of Queen Victoria, who developed his vision for a cu ...
, Founder of the
Schistosomiasis Control Initiative The SCI Foundation (SCI), or the Schistosomiasis Control Initiative, is a non-profit initiative that works with governments in sub-Saharan African countries to develop sustainable programmes against parasitic worm infections ( schistosomiasis an ...
(SCI) * Diana FleischmanAmerican
evolutionary psychologist Evolutionary psychology is a theoretical approach in psychology that examines cognition and behavior from a modern evolutionary perspective. It seeks to identify human psychological adaptations with regards to the ancestral problems they evolv ...
and senior lecturer at University of Portsmouth *
Bruce Friedrich Bruce Gregory Friedrich (born August 7, 1969) is co-founder and president of The Good Food Institute (GFI), a Y Combinator funded non-profit that promotes plant- and cell-based alternatives to animal products. He is also a co-founder of the alte ...
executive director of
The Good Food Institute The Good Food Institute (GFI) is a 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization that promotes plant- and cell-based alternatives to animal products, particularly meat, dairy, and eggs. It was created in 2016 by the nonprofit organization Mercy For Anima ...
, a non-profit that received donation funding from
Y Combinator Y Combinator (YC) is an American technology startup accelerator launched in March 2005. It has been used to launch more than 3,000 companies, including Airbnb, Coinbase, Cruise, DoorDash, Dropbox, Instacart, Quora, PagerDuty, Reddit, St ...
*
Clare Gallagher Clare Gallagher (born 1991 or 1992) is an American ultrarunner and environmental advocate. She is a past winner of both the Leadville 100 and Western State 100 races.  Early life Gallagher grew up in the suburbs of Denver, Colorado, wher ...
American ultrarunner *
Rachel Glennerster Rachel Glennerster (born 21 October 1965) is an Associate Professor of Economics at the University of Chicago. Glennerster served as chief economist for the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office, formerly the Department for International Dev ...
chief economist at the Department for International Development (DFID) * José GonzálezSwedish indie folk singer-songwriter and guitarist * Amelia GrayAmerican writer * Michael GregerAmerican physician, author, and professional speaker on public health issues and advocate for plant-based diets *
Sam Harris Samuel Benjamin Harris (born April 9, 1967) is an American philosopher, neuroscientist, author, and podcast host. His work touches on a range of topics, including rationality, religion, ethics, free will, neuroscience, meditation, psychedelics ...
American author,
philosopher A philosopher is a person who practices or investigates philosophy. The term ''philosopher'' comes from the grc, φιλόσοφος, , translit=philosophos, meaning 'lover of wisdom'. The coining of the term has been attributed to the Greek th ...
,
neuroscientist A neuroscientist (or neurobiologist) is a scientist who has specialised knowledge in neuroscience, a branch of biology that deals with the physiology, biochemistry, psychology, anatomy and molecular biology of neurons, neural circuits, and glial ...
, podcast host, and prominent atheist * A. J. JacobsAmerican journalist, author, and lecturer best known for writing about his lifestyle experiments *
Michael Kremer Michael Robert Kremer (born November 12, 1964) is an American development economist who is University Professor in Economics And Public Policy at the University of Chicago. He is the founding director of the Development Innovation Lab at the B ...
holder of the Nobel Memorial Prize in Economics, professor in economics and public policy at the
University of Chicago The University of Chicago (UChicago, Chicago, U of C, or UChi) is a private research university in Chicago, Illinois. Its main campus is located in Chicago's Hyde Park neighborhood. The University of Chicago is consistently ranked among the b ...
* Ben LesterBritish recording artist and multi-instrumentalist *
William MacAskill William David MacAskill (; born 24 March 1987) is a Scottish philosopher and author, as well as one of the originators of the effective altruism movement. He is an Associate Professor in Philosophy and Research Fellow at the Global Priorities I ...
associate professor in philosophy at the
University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...
*
Dylan Matthews Dylan Matthews is an American journalist. He is currently a correspondent for ''Vox (website), Vox'', an online media venture. Professional life Early writing In 2004, at the age of 14, Matthews launched a personal blog on politics and other is ...
American journalist, correspondent for '' Vox'' *
Toby Ord Toby David Godfrey Ord (born July 1979) is an Australian philosopher. He founded Giving What We Can in 2009, an international society whose members pledge to donate at least 10% of their income to effective charities, and is a key figure in the ...
senior research fellow at the University of Oxford's
Future of Humanity Institute The Future of Humanity Institute (FHI) is an interdisciplinary research centre at the University of Oxford investigating big-picture questions about humanity and its prospects. It was founded in 2005 as part of the Faculty of Philosophy and t ...
* Derek Parfitsenior research fellow at the
University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...
, visiting professor of philosophy at
Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...
,
New York University New York University (NYU) is a private research university in New York City. Chartered in 1831 by the New York State Legislature, NYU was founded by a group of New Yorkers led by then-Secretary of the Treasury Albert Gallatin. In 1832, the ...
, and
Rutgers University Rutgers University (; RU), officially Rutgers, The State University of New Jersey, is a Public university, public land-grant research university consisting of four campuses in New Jersey. Chartered in 1766, Rutgers was originally called Queen's ...
* Kelsey PiperAmerican journalist and staff writer at '' Vox'' *
Thomas Pogge Thomas Winfried Menko Pogge (; born 13 August 1953) is a German philosopher and is the Director of the Global Justice Program and Leitner Professor of Philosophy and International Affairs at Yale University. In addition to his Yale appointment, h ...
Leitner Professor of Philosophy and International Affairs at
Yale University Yale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut. Established in 1701 as the Collegiate School, it is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and among the most prestigious in the wo ...
, director of the Global Justice Program *
Leah Price Leah Price (born October 6, 1970) is an American literary critic who specializes in the British novel and in the history of the book. She is Henry Rutgers Distinguished Professor in the Department of English at Rutgers University and founding di ...
American literary critic *
Janet Radcliffe Richards Janet Radcliffe Richards (born 1944) is a British philosopher specialising in bioethics and feminism and Professor of Practical Philosophy at the University of Oxford. She is the author of ''The Sceptical Feminist'' (1980), ''Philosophical Probl ...
professor of practical philosophy at the
University of Oxford , mottoeng = The Lord is my light , established = , endowment = £6.1 billion (including colleges) (2019) , budget = £2.145 billion (2019–20) , chancellor ...
*
Romesh Ranganathan Jonathan Romesh Ranganathan (born 27 March 1978), is an English actor and comedian. He is known for his deadpan and often self-deprecating comedy. Ranganathan has made numerous appearances on television comedy panel shows, and in 2016 he co-p ...
English actor, comedian and presenter *
Peter Singer Peter Albert David Singer (born 6 July 1946) is an Australian moral philosopher, currently the Ira W. DeCamp Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University. He specialises in applied ethics and approaches ethical issues from a Secularit ...
professor of bioethics at
Princeton University Princeton University is a private research university in Princeton, New Jersey. Founded in 1746 in Elizabeth as the College of New Jersey, Princeton is the fourth-oldest institution of higher education in the United States and one of the ...
, and laureate professor at the Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics at the
University of Melbourne The University of Melbourne is a public research university located in Melbourne, Australia. Founded in 1853, it is Australia's second oldest university and the oldest in Victoria. Its main campus is located in Parkville, an inner suburb no ...
* Adam Swiftprofessor of political theory at
University College London , mottoeng = Let all come who by merit deserve the most reward , established = , type = Public research university , endowment = £143 million (2020) , budget = ...
*
Pilvi Takala Pilvi Takala (born 1981, Helsinki) is a performance artist presenting candid camera as art. Takala won the Dutch Prix de Rome in 2011 and the Emdash Award in 2013. Her works have been exhibited in various exhibitions worldwide, most recently in L ...
Finnish award-winning performance artist * Derek ThompsonAmerican journalist and staff writer at ''
The Atlantic ''The Atlantic'' is an American magazine and multi-platform publisher. It features articles in the fields of politics, foreign affairs, business and the economy, culture and the arts, technology, and science. It was founded in 1857 in Boston, ...
'' * Eva VivaltCanadian economist, assistant professor of economics at the
University of Toronto The University of Toronto (UToronto or U of T) is a public university, public research university in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, located on the grounds that surround Queen's Park (Toronto), Queen's Park. It was founded by royal charter in 1827 ...
and the founder of research institute AidGrade


References


External links


Giving What We Can
* {{Charity 2009 establishments in England Altruism British review websites Charities based in Oxfordshire Charity review websites Poverty-related organizations Organizations established in 2009 Charity Centre for Effective Altruism