Restringing

One Philosophy on Philanthropy: Kiva, ROI, and solving the knowledge problem

For some time I have been struggling to come up with a personal philosophy toward donations and philanthropy.  Growing up, I always felt some sense of social obligation to be donating to the guy on the corner, the Red Cross, poverty in developing countries, or one of a million things.  But how does one choose?

Until recently, I have resisted giving more than a couple dollars here and there.  I’ve always felt a bit stingy about it but my end goal isn’t to not be blindly charitable at any cost, it is to give to causes that I understand in a way that supports values that I believe in.

I also resisted because I felt, as a kid, my job was to become educated and be able to get a good job to support myself and my family.  Being able to donate a couple dollars in college is fine but I hope that it doesn’t compare to what I am able to give throughout my adult life.

Much like an investment philosophy, I want the highest return on my donation and think it is appropriate to ask: Why should I spend one dollar on aid today if I can invest it and have the ability to give several times that amount to similar problems in the future?

Furthermore, the government gives tax breaks to certain types of philanthropy so I need to ask myself what distortions this causes and how to approach them.  Do tax-incentivized methods of giving offer the best return on philanthropy or are there other methods which do better?

This is largely a personal question.  Each of us will value the problems we see in the world differently, so the answer I have come to shouldn’t be viewed as an absolute answer, but what best fits this description based on my values, my understanding of how the world works, and my current circumstances in life.

So what works best for me?

The best way that I have found to give is to enable creative individuals in low-income countries by giving entrepreneurs micro-loans in areas where governments tend to distort incentives and leave these people at a disadvantage.

While I don’t wish to over specify, I also try to make several of my loans to entrepreneurs in the agricultural industry.  These entrepreneurs frequently have the comparative advantage in economic terms but face both local and international political challenges as developed countries use protectionist measures to subsidize international competitors and local governments use agriculture boards and a hodgepodge of other regulations to transfer wealth from the agricultural export industry.

ROI as a Micro-lender

Let’s say you donate $25, 4 times a year to the guy hanging outside Whole Foods.  Very nice of you, but unlikely your money goes much farther than that.  It will likely be consumed by that individual and return little more than that.  In 10 years time, you will have donated a total of $1000.

Year 01: 4*25 = 100
Year 02: 4*25 = 100
Year 03: 4*25 = 100
Year 04: 4*25 = 100
Year 05: 4*25 = 100
Year 06: 4*25 = 100
Year 07: 4*25 = 100
Year 08: 4*25 = 100
Year 09: 4*25 = 100
Year 10: 4*25 = 100
—————————-
Total = $1000

But, if you donate $25, 4 times a year through the Kiva loan system, not only are you enabling a motivated individual who is pursuing an idea to create value in society (that will give back at a local level in their community) but you slowly get your money back and can re-invest it in other entrepreneurs.  In 10 years, being generous with the same amount of money, (my rough and slightly improper math suggests) you will have donated (invested?) around $5500:

Year 01: 4*25 = 100
Year 02: 4*25 = 100 + 100 = 200
Year 03: 4*25 = 100 + 200 = 300
Year 04: 4*25 = 100 + 300 = 400
Year 05: 4*25 = 100 + 400 = 500
Year 06: 4*25 = 100 + 500 = 600
Year 07: 4*25 = 100 + 600 = 700
Year 08: 4*25 = 100 + 700 = 800
Year 09: 4*25 = 100 + 800 = 900
Year 10: 4*25 = 100 + 900 = 1000
—————————————-
Total = ~$5500

Awesome?  I think so.

In celebration of an elegant solution to the knowledge problem: Join the Kiva Team Information is Beautiful.

Food for Ninjas Competitive Cooking Blog

Food is meant to be shared and, relentlessly, it is compared.  What started out as a shared Google Doc between some friends and family has now become a competitive cooking blog worth flippin’ out about. Epicurious George reporting from Food for Ninjas.

Gorehorn, the Adventure Pony

If you’re looking for an activity to soften a long drive, I recommend an extravagant Mix CD Challenge!  Our trip was from Arlington, Virginia to Durham, North Carolina.  The challenge was simple: invent two album names and assign them to other people on the trip.  Each person takes the album names they are given, contemplates for a while, stirs up a vision, and creates the perfect mix for such an album name.  The results can be stunning and add a whole new dimension to the music you once thought you knew.  While I can’t share our concoctions so easily, the album names should reflect how we made four hours speed by in a flash:

• Euclid’s Last Stand
• Genghis Kahn and the Band Wagon
• Goodnight Spoon
• Gorehorn, the Adventure Pony
• How To Dismantle a ‘71 Ford Pinto’
• Jeanne Kirkpatrick Overdrive
• Kind of Periwinkle
• The Longings of Seedless Watermelons

Update: April 2008

A re-posting of a recent letter that I sent to family and friends.

Well into the new year, so much has changed and I just wanted to pause a moment, greet you with a note, and share a few stories (likely with too many references to economics!).

Two years ago I moved out to the mysterious land of Virginia (where people introduce themselves with their full name).  It’s no California, but it was good enough for Thomas Jefferson and has turned out to be quite good to me.  I have benefit from good company, plenty of opportunities, and, pleasantly, an enjoyable dance scene (where I have lead only one, fortunate, relationship-commencing, knee injury).

Up until this past October I worked at the Institute for Humane Studies.  My main responsibility was to manage our globalization education project which included maintaining a website and directing several summer seminars on the topic.  The job gave me the opportunity to work with several top notch faculty members and hundreds of bright, enthusiastic students.  In the process, I have increased my fondness of teaching basic economic principles and developed a strong interest in alternatives to our traditional methods of education.

In the spirit of education, this past Fall greeted me with some new opportunities.  I made it over to Switzerland for a one week conference on sustainability.  I won’t hazard a guess as to whether I will remember the bike rides through the Alps or my hosts’ Malthusian diatribes with more clarity, though if I were to recommend a memorable experience, the way the layers of clouds pattern the valley below Braunwald is indeed striking.

On my return, and with my blessing, it was decided that we cancel the globalization project I was working on.  It’s a challenging decision to terminate something you have worked hard to make succeed, yet my economics training never fails to remind me that if you can’t increase the value of the resources you are using, you are best to let those resources find a higher valued use elsewhere.  The shocking part came as I realized half of my job was contingent on this decision.

While it is only human nature to be somewhat frustrated at the occurrence of unexpected change, I responded in another way only something as savvy as human nature could suggest: I didn’t sleep for three days.  After a handful of conversations with close friends (and with myself), somewhere between insomnia and bliss, it became clear that I too was a misallocated resource and due for some new goals.

Programming, animation, web design: they all got put on the top of my list.  I started training in a variety of internet technologies and began the process of beginning my own information design business aptly titled: Information is Beautiful.  And it is.  (Nicely, the seminar half of my job at IHS is also still on my plate.)

In a year or so, I’m sure I will have a few more stories to share.  I’m sure they will be full of romance, intrigue, and the struggles and triumphs of a protagonist and his trade.

In the meantime, I wish you many beautiful days.  I hope you are in good health and spending time with the people and pursuits that you love.  Let me know if you will be in Virginia in the near future and I promise I won’t geek out (too much) about productivity blogs, the wonders of Javascript libraries, Edward Tufte, or Settlers of Catan.

Dinosaurlandia

Deep in the heart of Virginia, six friends find themselves in a land unfamiliar and rare…  Their task: 1) Shoot a bunch of video, 2) Share that video amongst everyone, and 3) Let each person tell the story as it was.  Here’s my take on the fiction-enhanced memories.

UPDATE: Another fine entry: Dinos Alive!

Recipe: Mock Mince Meat Pie

Mix together the following ingredients and stir until well-blended.

1.5 cups Seedless Raisins 4 medium-sized Tart Apples (Cut into small pieces and squeeze in lemon juice so they do not turn brown) 10-15 dried Apricots (Cut into Small peices) Grated rind of 1 large Orange Juice of one Orange .5 cup of Sparkling Apple Cider (or other fruit juice) Handful of broken Walnuts (optional) .75 - 1 cup Brown Sugar (a mix of brown and white sugar is also good)

In a large frying pan, cover these ingredients and simmer until the apples are very soft (add more cider to keep them from scorching).  (You can also add in 2-3 tablespoons of Brandy while these wonderful flavors are simmering together.)

I mixed these in with the above ingredients (minus the crackers and tapioca, which I did not include).  Mom might have suggested these ingredients get mixed in after the simmering (I couldn’t tell from the handwriting).

.5 tsp Cinnamon .5 tsp Cloves 1+ tsp fresh grated Nutmeg 2-3 tlbs finely crushed soda cracker (or cracker meal and 2-3 tlbs tapiocca)

Preheat oven to 450 Make a nice Pie Crust

Bake for 30 minutes or so.

Mmmmmm!

Car Service and Grammar

Without excessive qualifications, I would like to state that I am a big fan of open borders.  I am also a big fan of grammatical errors (if we would be so harsh to call them by such a derogatory label).

That said, I recently had a general maintenance check up done to my car.  I received this letter in the mail shortly after.

It starts in a very collegiate manner, "Dear Parizek,"  and resolves with my advisor looking forward to "better serve [me] vehicle in the future."  I am particularly fond of the northeastern slant to the entire work and the general disregard for any margins.

The service was excellent.

Arlington Decency

Arlington County is not one for much decency.  For example, everyone in Arlington is required to have a safety inspection every year and place an ugly, half-crooked sticker in the middle of their front windshield to prove they have done so.  Apparently, they promptly come sneaking around the day that these stickers expire to issue tickets.

I have been here for a month.  I found a nice place and, ever since I moved in, I have been parking in a spot right in front of my house along the street.  This is why it surprised me when I woke up this past week with a parking ticket on my car.

Confused, I looked to confirm that there weren’t any “No Parking” signs that had gone unnoticed, but my memories of a sign-free street were untrue.  My parking spot sat cowering in the wake of a spotless, new “No Parking” sign.  Funny.  The base of the signpost even exhibited freshly turned dirt and city project markings.  The pictures may help you visualize the “funniness” of this moment.

My favorite part is that on the back of the sign, the date and time at which it was installed are sharpied on.  The day was the same day that I received my ticket, twelve hours prior.

And so, unsuspectingly, as I returned from a pleasant day at work and an enjoyable evening of swing dancing, and forgot to check for new parking regulations posted in the spot where I had been parking for over a month straight, I had signed up for trouble.

Ill let you know how my modest contention letter fares.  I admit my illegality and ask for the simple decency of information before unnecessary monetary punishment.  Even the San Jose State bicycle dictators have been courteous enough to place a warning on students bicycles before blindly ticketing them for laws that came into effect within the last 12 hours of the day. 

On a more subtle note of how SJSU bike laws are like the US foreign policy with Cuba, I can defer you to one of my many unpublished letters to the editor.

House Plan: Folding Shirts

Throw this one in the blueprints.  I am definitely folding my shirts this way from this day forward.  (Slow-mo recommended.)

Hopping New Year

Good day and happy New Year!  I hope for you, at least; I missed it this year.

In fact, my whole trip went well besides that little glitch, of which I have now become quite proud.  Upon leaving California the Tuesday after Christmas, the rain stopped.  I had arranged Jack (my car, in the spirit of Kerouac) into the ultimate travel machine.  I laid the back seats flat dividing the hatchback into two parts: 1) a row of boxes, topped with the essentials and 2) two pieces of egg-crate style foam bedding decorated just as you would a bed, in a little less space.  Conveniently, my passenger seat also folds flat, so I could comfortably pull into any rest-area type space and snuggle under the warmest of comforters for a good night (or mid-day) sleep.

I enjoyed the sunrises of Flagstaff, Arizona; Santa Fe, New Mexico and the grasslands of western Oklahoma.  On the flipside I enjoyed the sunsets of Memphis and Nashville, Tennessee.  Georgia OKeeffe’s New Mexico is the autumn of landscapes.  While perhaps I like the grasslands for the same reason that Andy Warhol likes mechanized art: its very repetitive, but there are so many imperfections.  In Nashville, I caught the Grand Ol’ Opry, the staple of live radio shows for your bluegrass and country diet.  And, having had such a pleasant evening, I decided to wrap up my New Years celebration right there at 9:00pm.  I hit the road.  As I had been stopping at internet cafes and surfing Craigslist, scheduling house visits for potential places to rent upon my arrival in Virginia on New Years day, I still had a long road ahead of me.

Around 11:45pm is when it hit me.  I believe its called teleportation.  I was trying to decide on the best way to start violently honking my horn and flashing my headlights at the nearest car on the desolate highway without provoking that person into a road-rage-like response (to share the celebration of the New Year, of course).  But then I saw a sign.  Not just any sign, but a street sign.  It read: Crossing into the Eastern Standard Time Zone.  Poof.  12:45am.

By any means I arrived safely in Virginia.  Within a half-hour I had a room and after a few trips to IKEA (I finally understand), I am happily situated in Arlington.  Take a look. I live right near that little red arrow.  I work down at the green one.

And that gets you close to up to date.  I haven’t told you about how much I enjoy the details of work, or why.  Nor have I told you much about the place I live and my mysterious and pleasant roommates.  Those will be stories for another time.

Corrections

It turns out I wasnt entirely robbed.  Just the chocolate.  And my favorite big bench is gone as well.  These last two facts are the hardest to take.  I had a photo shoot planned for this wonderful bench.

Also, I might point out that my diffuse labeling of “those grey double-holed bricks” was not an attempt to be poetic.  I have since been informed that these items are known to most English speakers as ‘cinder blocks.’   (Thank you for the correction.)  May the image be a bit clearer for everyone now.

Tropical House Plan: Tree Orchids

Are there any flowers that we can tie to trees in California?  At the university where I spend my time here in Guatemala, there are orchids tied to half of the trees.  Unfortunately, it is not the season to see them in bloom but the potential of their quantity and the way they are tied to the trees with twine is very attractive in itself.

Living Large Though Short on Rent

My keychain now reads “Christo Vive!,” a careless pastel sunset and the silhouette of a couple of sailboats and seabirds seasoning the cutout of the letters.  It was more by a matter of chance that these keys come upon me, the visiting professor who inhabited this flat before me being called home, and the convenient month window of my stay slipping nicely in before the visiting professor of the year to come arrives.

Along with the artistries of a prehistoric skateboard and a multiple broad-ended canoes, I enjoy a spacious two-bedroom, two-bath, two-balcony house with a study and spacious, interconnected kitchen, dining room and living room.

All within a five-minute drive from the University, a five-minute walk from a very nice bakery, and a five-minute strut from what is called the ‘zona viva’ which is conveniently placed just out of ears distance from my ajar windows.

I was even provided a mobile phone and four large vases of colorful flowers upon arrival and I probably began to take this all for granted as when I returned home this past evening to find I had been something akin to robbed.  The flowers I had signed off the day before, though the living room table, a chocolate bar and my laundry basket have now also vanished.

I wont miss the living room table, as the kitchen table along with its behemoth of a bench has been my social home, although the chocolate bar (macadamia nut) and the laundry basket will be missed.

All of the information that can be derived from my forensic apartment-dweller wisdom is that the phantom of the apartment is smart (there were three other chocolate flavors to choose from and they chose macadamia) and kind hearted (having removed my dirty clothes from the laundry basket before making off with it) aside from their kleptomania.

Possible Moral: there are costs to complementary rent; stationary furnishings and chocolate are commensurate with the proper monthly dues.

Carlos Alberto Montaner

This past week, we have enjoyed the visit of Carlos Alberto Montaner, a well-known Cuban writer, here in Guayaquil.

His prosaic words have taken us between the heights of the Bankers Club, the Oro Verde and the Hilton Colon, and lead me to enjoy some of the best meals to be found in these parts.

His book, Liberty and it’s Enemies, will accompany me on my trip north.