another pointless political rant

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I take it you didn't read the OP?

I'm not interested whether Bezos is crook, Amazon is wrecking city centres or any other political rant, just reality. If you buy from/through Amazon, do it through Amazon Smile, a minute proportion (1/2% iirc) goes to a nominated charity. Not on everything, not a lot, but it's money they wouldn't have got otherwise.

Except that the donations are a tax write off, so if they donate to charity they pay less tax and that means less money in the government coffers to spend on people who need it (theoretically)
 
You didn't read it either? Why don't you start another moan thread?

I'll get banned if I do.

I was just pointing out that " it's money they wouldn't have got otherwise" is not really true, the money in the system is the same, it just might be allocated differently.
I did read the OP, but the discussion has gone a different way now and you have commented on that too.
 
Henning Wehn‘s comment resonated with me.

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It’s a shame our successive governments haven’t made these multi nationals pay the taxes they should
 
This is the most egregious example I have seen recently. It was reported in the Daily Fail so take it for what it's worth. This is a charity that was set up as part of the "Me Too" movement.
  • Tax filings reveal Times' Up organization raised $3,670,219 in 2018 in its first year of operation but spent $1,407,032 on salaries and $312,001 on helping victims
  • Documents reveal the organization spent more than $157,000 on a luxury retreat
  • Almost $1m was spend on legal costs and $288,000 on advertising
  • A separate Legal Defense Fund claims to have helped '3,000 women' during the first six months of 2018 at a cost of $1.7m using money coming from donations
  • But most of the fund money came from grants made to the Women's Law Center, while just $132,575 came from the Time's Up Foundation
  • Time's Up Now, the charity's lobbying end, handed over $179,426 to the fund

So $3,670,219 raised, $132,575 directly used for the stated cause. That's less than 4%
 
I take it you didn't read the OP?

I'm not interested whether Bezos is crook, Amazon is wrecking city centres or any other political rant, just reality. If you buy from/through Amazon, do it through Amazon Smile, a minute proportion (1/2% iirc) goes to a nominated charity. Not on everything, not a lot, but it's money they wouldn't have got otherwise.

Yeah I read the OP... You said you were interested in 'reality'. I was responding to that notion.
 
Charities are large businesses. Cancer Research UK has an annual income of £624m, and Age UK £128m.

They are complex organisations and need professional management - financial, medical, project management, marketing etc etc.

The salaries need to be sufficient to attract those with the right skills. Professional managers (including my daughter incidentally) expect to be reasonably rewarded for efforts, skills etc even if they don't expect to get top quartile salaries.

Incidentally I am sure Amazon regard this as a promotional cost - it is trivial compared to other forms of promotion and may even elicit some positive "do good" emotions.
 
I think the way Amazon is doing it is a lot better than the register charities here. By that, I mean you go to the store to buy something trivial and the retail person at the register has a jar out for some charity and they're verbally asking if you'd like to donate some amount of money to xyz charity and have it added to your bill. I think I may have said yes once in a lifetime.

You get no chance to know anything about the charity, what you give is just flatly added to your bill, and if you're out and about, you get hit with it over and over. It's apparently not enough that you go into the store and buy the items at full price without dickering.

I've always been curious if the retailers take your charity dollars, donate it in their corporation name and then take a tax write off for it.
 
It's a nice thought Phil - thanks for letting me know about it. I use Amazon a lot and hadn't heard of it.
 
Out shopping a few days ago I noticed someone in the street with a collection can for a charity that I would normally give to. This time I walked on by. I recently volounteered for them, working full time for 1 month without pay, and having seen up close how (the local part of) their organisation is run I doubt I will ever donate to them again.

This puts me in a quandry. That organisation is a well known international charity with a good reputation but when you look behind the curtain it is not so great. If I can't donate to them, who can I donate to?
 
I dont think its Amazon that is wrecking the city center, for that the only peole who have the power to buy are the public. Possibly best you lay the blame there.
Business rates wreck city centres more than anything. That's why there are so many charity shops they get 80% off apparently.
Rates are really bad news for small business, you could be a one man craft worker next to an estate agent with 100x turnover but same rates for same space.
 
I dont think its Amazon that is wrecking the city center, for that the only peole who have the power to buy are the public. Possibly best you lay the blame there.

Certainly for our area the local council aren't helping either. Buses to the city centre are very expensive and parking charges are horrendous. Doesn't encourage people to go out and shop for a few hours.
 
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