Introduction

 Working on the introduction to the paper that establishes the research question and a bit more about the project.

It  is  estimated  that  in  2019  $449.64  billion  was  donated  through  charity, the  majority  of  which  (69%)  was  given  by  individuals.   Of  this,  the  majority of  individual  charitable  giving  was  local,  in  that  the  gifts  went  to  an  organization or person nearby to the giver.  In contrast, organizations that attempt to determine the marginal benefit of charitable giving,  (givewell.org,  thelifeyoucansave.org) typically rate international giving as far more impactful.  This disconnect between actual giving and its impact, is simultaneously pedestrian and profound;  people are inspired and concerned about those near them,  yet our societies are limited by both their structures and their intentions.  In order to explore this disconnect we build an explicit model that can compare agents that are globally altruistic, with agents that are locally altruistic.

The  disconnect  in  charitable  giving  has  proven  an  ethical  and  practical quandary.  Movements like Effective Altruism (EA) advocate for those in developed countries to give significant portions of their income to highly effective and efficient charities internationally where each dollar can buy more.  Meanwhile, poverty throughout the United States continues rise and the majority of assisting organizations are local.  There is a need to recognize the importance of local knowledge and connection to guide giving while at the same time taking into the  account  inequalities  between  countries.   Indeed,  there  are  likely  practical trade-offs between giving locally and globally, especially when people are more likely to give more if they can observe the impact of their gift.

We conceptualize the trade-off between local and distant giving as a question about a person’s radius  of  concern, wherein the size of this radius determines how many people a person considers to give charitably to. From this perspective, we consider the question:  how does charitable giving depend on this radius, and what radius maximizes charitable giving?