Money: The Unit of Caring doesn’t apply to you. Or rather, you’re on the opposite end of that spectrum.
For every $100/hr lawyer who donates an hour worth of his paycheck in exchange for labor, there needs to be ten man hours worth of available labor to convert that into charity (if they’re getting paid $10/hr). If you’re making less than $10/hr, then it’s more efficient for you to donate time instead of money, assuming you’re as productive as hired labor.
There’s this thing called “Ricardo’s Law of Comparative Advantage”. There’s this idea called “professional specialization”. There’s this notion of “economies of scale”. There’s this concept of “gains from trade”. The whole reason why we have money is to realize the tremendous gains possible from each of us doing what we do best.
Yes, people are sometimes limited in their ability to trade time for money (underemployed), so that it is better for them if they can directly donate that which they would usually trade for money. If the soup kitchen needed a lawyer, and the lawyer donated a large contiguous high-priority block of lawyering, then that sort of volunteering makes sense—that’s the same specialized capability the lawyer ordinarily trades for money.
If you’re a lawyer, then your comparative advantage comes in the form of giving money or lawyering. If you’re a minimum wage laborer, then your comparative advantage comes in the form of giving minimum wage labor or in giving yourself a professional specialization.
There also exists things where money is not an advantage. Actually, I should rephrase that. There exists things where the advantage of making more money does not out-do your inherent advantage as an interested, proximate human being. Giving blood is a great example. Yes, money allows the agencies to pay for more plasma donations, but just by being a steady donor you’re trading something you don’t need (excess blood production) for something a charity can use (blood). Another example is political advocacy. Your knowledge and interest in a subject is valuable, and can be converted into faxes/phonecalls/letters/emails to your congressman and senators. A $10 donation to your favorite political group is less efficient in changing policy than a $8 donation and 12 minute fax/phonecall to your elected officials.
The message of Money: The Unit of Caring isn’t that we should spend cash for everything; it’s that charity is not a separate magisterium. If you are most efficient doing lawyer work in the market, you’re most efficient doing lawyer work for charity; if you’re most efficient as a menial laborer in the market, you’re most efficient as a menial laborer in charity. If the conversion from labor->dollars->charity is more efficient than labor->charity, then use the former; if it’s the other way around, then use the latter.
Money: The Unit of Caring doesn’t apply to you. Or rather, you’re on the opposite end of that spectrum.
For every $100/hr lawyer who donates an hour worth of his paycheck in exchange for labor, there needs to be ten man hours worth of available labor to convert that into charity (if they’re getting paid $10/hr). If you’re making less than $10/hr, then it’s more efficient for you to donate time instead of money, assuming you’re as productive as hired labor.
If you’re a lawyer, then your comparative advantage comes in the form of giving money or lawyering. If you’re a minimum wage laborer, then your comparative advantage comes in the form of giving minimum wage labor or in giving yourself a professional specialization.
There also exists things where money is not an advantage. Actually, I should rephrase that. There exists things where the advantage of making more money does not out-do your inherent advantage as an interested, proximate human being. Giving blood is a great example. Yes, money allows the agencies to pay for more plasma donations, but just by being a steady donor you’re trading something you don’t need (excess blood production) for something a charity can use (blood). Another example is political advocacy. Your knowledge and interest in a subject is valuable, and can be converted into faxes/phonecalls/letters/emails to your congressman and senators. A $10 donation to your favorite political group is less efficient in changing policy than a $8 donation and 12 minute fax/phonecall to your elected officials.
The message of Money: The Unit of Caring isn’t that we should spend cash for everything; it’s that charity is not a separate magisterium. If you are most efficient doing lawyer work in the market, you’re most efficient doing lawyer work for charity; if you’re most efficient as a menial laborer in the market, you’re most efficient as a menial laborer in charity. If the conversion from labor->dollars->charity is more efficient than labor->charity, then use the former; if it’s the other way around, then use the latter.