Doing Good Better: Effective Altruism and a Radical New Way to Make a Difference

by William MacAskill

The third organisation is GiveDirectly. Its programme is simple: it transfers money from donors directly to some of the poorest people in Kenya and Uganda who are then free to use that money however they wish. Using what is called the M-Pesa system, cell phones are used as makeshift bank accounts, thereby enabling an easy transfer of money from foreign bank accounts to the poor. GiveDirectly uses satellite images to find households with thatched roofs (a strong indicator of poverty, compared to iron roofs) and then contacts those households to discuss the programme. If the household is willing, GiveDirectly transfers them a lump sum of $1,000, which is equal to a little more than one year’s total income for that household. In their words: Recipients use transfers for whatever is most important to them; we never tell them what to do. An independent evaluation of our work in Kenya by Innovations for Poverty Action found that recipients use transfers for a wide variety of purposes that on average generate large income gains. Common uses range from buying food to investing in tangible assets such as housing and livestock to investing in children’s education.