Reply To: Honest Tzedakah

zahavasdad — of course you’re right. These people know that if they spend $15,000,000 on advertising, prizes, and other shtick, they can raise $30,000,000, netting way more than if they spent only $1,000 or $1,000,000. I don’t blame these people at all, clearly it works for them which is why they’re doing it.

But now think about all of the waste — $15,000,000 is not going to help people. If they spent $75 million to make $100 million, thus netting even more, would that be an even better idea?

Of every dollar that you give them, less than 40 cents actually directly helps people. Do you count money that you give to this towards your maaser? or do you count only $40 of every $100 contribution? Do you think that this is a yashar way of raising money, when so much is being wasted, even if the idea is that it brings in more?