Kiva Team Anandtech is 8 years old! $16,275 micro-loaned to the developing world

[AreaCode707]

Well, our 8 year team anniversary is in 2 days. The team currently only has 16 members, but between us we've made 442 loans in 47 countries! And yes, Anandtech has put more than $16k out there in the world to help people.

https://www.kiva.org/team/anandtech

If you're not familiar with Kiva, it's a micro-lending site where you can pick your own folks to lend to based on their particular needs and stories. For example, here's a lady who hopes to borrow $450 to build a shed for her cows and goats so that she can better provide for herself and family through her farm business:
https://www.kiva.org/lend/1237654

Look at the goats! The internet loves goats! Don't you want the goats to be happy?

If you're already on Kiva, consider joining Team Anandtech. If you're not on Kiva, it only takes $25 to make your first loan to help others in need. Let's get up to 20 people on the team in the next two days for our anniversary!

https://www.kiva.org/invitedto/anandtech/by/areacode707

 

[brainhulk]

how much interest do I make on these loans? Those shady goats look like they won't pay me back

 

[IEC]

As long as it goes to helping people improve their lives, I don't care if I make a penny.

That's why I can take the itemized deduction versus the standard one on my taxes...

Tag for later

 

[JEDI]

Well, our 8 years team anniversary is . The team currently only has 16 members, but between us we've made 442 loans in 47 countries! And yes, Anandtech has put more than $16k out there in the world to help people.

https://www.kiva.org/team/anandtech

If you're not familiar with Kiva, it's a micro-lending site where you can pick your own folks to lend to based on their particular needs and stories. For example, here's a lady who hopes to borrow $450 to build a shed for her cows and goats so that she can better provide for herself and family through her farm business:
https://www.kiva.org/lend/1237654

Look at the goats! The internet loves goats! Don't you want the goats to be happy?

If you're already on Kiva, consider joining Team Anandtech. If you're not on Kiva, it only takes $25 to make your first loan to help others in need. Let's get up to 20 people on the team in the next two days for our anniversary!

https://www.kiva.org/invitedto/anandtech/by/areacode707

ok Hotchick, how much of that $16k have u gotten back?

 

[Thebobo]

Well, our 8 years team anniversary is . The team currently only has 16 members, but between us we've made 442 loans in 47 countries! And yes, Anandtech has put more than $16k out there in the world to help people.

https://www.kiva.org/team/anandtech

If you're not familiar with Kiva, it's a micro-lending site where you can pick your own folks to lend to based on their particular needs and stories. For example, here's a lady who hopes to borrow $450 to build a shed for her cows and goats so that she can better provide for herself and family through her farm business:
https://www.kiva.org/lend/1237654

Look at the goats! The internet loves goats! Don't you want the goats to be happy?

If you're already on Kiva, consider joining Team Anandtech. If you're not on Kiva, it only takes $25 to make your first loan to help others in need. Let's get up to 20 people on the team in the next two days for our anniversary!

https://www.kiva.org/invitedto/anandtech/by/areacode707

Very cool, I never knew of this congratulations on your work so far.

 

[RollWave]

How are these people verified?

 

[AreaCode707]

ok Hotchick, how much of that $16k have u gotten back?

I've never had anyone default on the loans I've made, so I've gotten back 100% of my investments. (Just noting that that 16k isn't all me by a long stretch, so I definitely didn't get 16k back... though if anyone wants to PayPal me 16k I promise to put it all into Kiva loans! )

 

[Kaido]

lol @ the thread tags

Cool idea!

 

[AreaCode707]

How are these people verified?

Through third party charities that manage the actual loans and they do their own vetting so ymmv, although my experiences have all been good. Each Kiva loan shows you the charity it runs through, a rating of that charity's risk level, whether there's possible currency loss in the exchange, etc.

 

[MrSquished]

You are enabling foreign people to grow and hate the USA. VIVA LA TRUMP!

 

[Kaido]

ok Hotchick, how much of that $16k have u gotten back?

3-year-old response, but an interesting read:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Futurology..._with_kivaorg_the_peertopeer_lending/cc4udsv/

Another discussion thread:

https://www.reddit.com/r/nerdfighters/comments/2duixl/does_kiva_actually_help_the_poor_i_want_to/

I have a couple friends who do on-site remote charity work & it's very interesting to hear the other half of the story about how money (and goods) actually impact people, sometimes detrimentally, rather than being a globally beneficial activity for all involved.

 

[IEC]

3-year-old response, but an interesting read:

https://www.reddit.com/r/Futurology..._with_kivaorg_the_peertopeer_lending/cc4udsv/

Another discussion thread:

https://www.reddit.com/r/nerdfighters/comments/2duixl/does_kiva_actually_help_the_poor_i_want_to/

I have a couple friends who do on-site remote charity work & it's very interesting to hear the other half of the story about how money (and goods) actually impact people, sometimes detrimentally, rather than being a globally beneficial activity for all involved.

That's... rather sobering.

 

[AreaCode707]

You are enabling foreign people to grow and hate the USA. VIVA LA TRUMP!

Yes, those effing poverty-stricken Peruvians. Damn them to hell.

 

[piesquared]

I'll just move this post to the proper forum...

 

[Kaido]

That's... rather sobering.

It gets really complicated. Things like voluntourism can have really bad effects sometimes:

http://america.aljazeera.com/opinio...urismwhitevoluntouristsafricaaidsorphans.html

An 'imperialistic' POV:

http://www.worldtravelguide.net/holidays/editorial-feature/voluntourism-should-i-volunteer-abroad

“I spoke to one girl who went to Tanzania to build a school,” says Mark Watson, the Executive Director of Tourism Concern, a charity campaigning on ethical tourism issues. “She told me the volunteers always gossiped about how lazy the locals were because they slept for most of the morning. “It was only at the end of the placement that they discovered that every day, after they finished building a wall, the locals had to come and rebuild it again properly. So the whole thing was a completely pointless exercise.”

“I talk to a lot of people who say they want to dig wells in Africa,” says Watson. “I say what Africa has got quite a lot of is unskilled labour; there are a lot of people out there that can dig wells. “The idea that you, as an unskilled worker, have got anything really useful that you can add is slightly arrogant and sort of imperialistic in some ways – white people going out to Africa to help the Africans.” So does this mean Watson would like to see an end to volunteer placements abroad? “I think it’s mostly about getting people to be realistic; you’re just doing it for yourself, it’s a holiday. You’re not really going to do anything particularly worthwhile, and that’s quite a hard message to get across.”

But then you step back & say, at least you're doing something to help, and isn't something better than nothing? Because it's easy to criticize organizations & activities due to their flaws. But this also lends those organizations a cover of altruism that lets them skate by criticism, and scratches our first-world itch to make ourselves feel good by donating. So, it gets complicated. You can't fix everything everywhere & no system is going to be perfect, so you kind of have to pick your battles, and there are lots of options like Kiva Zip & alternatives like Zidsha that let you do P2P lending with lower overhead so that it's not quite as capitalistic as other programs. Which surprisingly isn't actually a bad thing...for a good opposing argument (picking some good points off the reddit links), here's a really good TED Talk to listen to:

http://www.ted.com/talks/dan_pallotta_the_way_we_think_about_charity_is_dead_wrong

One particular good quote:

So we've all been taught that charities should spend as little as possible on overhead things like fundraising under the theory that, well, the less money you spend on fundraising, the more money there is available for the cause. Well, that's true if it's a depressing world in which this pie cannot be made any bigger. But if it's a logical world in which investment in fundraising actually raises more funds and makes the pie bigger, then we have it precisely backwards, and we should be investing more money, not less, in fundraising, because fundraising is the one thing that has the potential to multiply the amount of money available for the cause that we care about so deeply.

I think what it boils down to is picking your battles and deciding how & if you personally want to help others. Despite what the detractors say, sites like Kiva are pretty cool & throwing $25 over to help someone in need isn't going to kill most people & can really help out people in desperate situations. I do think charity is a good (and necessary) thing for a variety of reasons, but everyone has to choose & vet the places they donate to with time, money, or goods themselves. Working at a soup kitchen one weekend a month doesn't really fix anyone to the point where they can provide for themselves, but it makes you feel good & you're providing a legitimate service to a person who is in need of it right at that moment & that is a pretty solid thing to do, so there are also a number of ways to look at charitable contributions of your time, effort, finances, and goods rather than trying to "save the world"...sometimes it just means helping one person out in a small way that can make your day better, which is always something I appreciate when others do it to me.

 

[JEDI]

I've never had anyone default on the loans I've made, so I've gotten back 100% of my investments. (Just noting that that 16k isn't all me by a long stretch, so I definitely didn't get 16k back... though if anyone wants to PayPal me 16k I promise to put it all into Kiva loans! )

wait... it's not a pool?

so whats the point in joining Kiva Team anandtech?

 

[DaveSimmons]

wait... it's not a pool?

so whats the point in joining Kiva Team anandtech?

To show those mooks at TomsHardware who's boss?

I already donate to a widows and orphans charity in Burundi ( https://sisterconnection.org/ ) where I know some of the people involved, but it sounds like Kiva still does some good despite the points raised in that reddit thread.

30% interest isn't much above credit card rates these days, and it's unrealistic to expect the local lenders that Kiva partners with will all be non-profits (which really means subsidized by foreign aid). And a CEO salary of $136K is not out of line for a large charity.

Voluntourism is silly waste though. It would be better to volunteer in your own community and send the plane fare to someone who actually helps (Doctors Without Borders?)