donating money to help people can be a wonderful and selfless act,

but how can you feel confident that your donations are improving or saving lives

effectively? You could do weeks of research to find the

charities that are out there, what programs they run,

how effective these programs are, and how the charity might use your money.

Or you could just visit givewell.org. There, you'll get a short,

vetted list of the best charities they found at saving or improving lives per

dollar. Givewell spends over 20,000 hours each year,

researching charitable organizations and only recommends a few of the highest

impact evidence-backed charities they found. Over 50,000 donors have used Givewell to donate

more than $750 million. A rigorous evidence suggests that those donations will save

tens of thousands of lives and improve the lives of millions more.

And here's the best part. Givewell is free. Givewell wants to empower as many donors as

possible to make informed decisions about their donations. They publish all

their research and recommendations on their site for free. No sign of

required. They allocate your tax deductible donation to the charity you

choose without taking a cut. If you've never donated to Givewell's

recommended charities before, you can have your donation matched up to $250

before the end of the year or as long as matching funds last.

To claim your match, go to givewell.org and pick podcast

and enter animal spirits at checkout. Make sure they know that you heard about Givewell

from animal spirits to get your donation matched.

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