The spirit of giving is in full flower during the holiday season, and that's as it should be. So much of the year is devoted to getting and taking that a simple act of charity can do wonders for the soul.
The corollary to this generous instinct is that fund-raisers for worthy and not-so-worthy causes are bombarding homes and businesses with holiday pleas for money. Some are scams, but most are legitimate. The difficulty is in trying to separate the needy from the slick, the benevolent from the commercial.There is no easy way to compare charitable causes, but asking questions about where money is spent and how much goes into staff salaries, administrative costs and fund-raising expenses might be a good place to start.
Telefunders are particularly hard to evaluate because you're dealing with a disembodied voice that may be coming from a phone booth, a boiler room or a cabana in Boca Raton. For free advice on how to deal with telephone appeals, send a stamped, self-addressed envelope to Holiday Giving, Council of Better Business Bureaus, 4200 Wilson Blvd., Suite 800, Arlington, VA 22203.
The council also publishes an annual charity index ($12.95) with detailed information about more than 200 national charities, including the size of the paid staff, the salary of the chief executive and how much of the money they raise reaches the needy.
A rating guide on 300 popular charities is available by sending a check for $3 to the American Institute of Philanthropy, 4579 Laclede Ave., Suite K3, St. Louis, MO 63108.
It may seem cynical to raise questions about organizations that claim to be doing good deeds, but donors to charitable causes have a right to know where their money goes. It's one thing to be generous and compassionate over the holidays; it's something else to be gullible when somebody passes the hat around.