Does anyone have any knowlege as to wheather or not United Way supports or allocates funds to any anti-gun groups ? This topic came up last year in a corporate meeting for the United Way campain, and nobody ever did get a substanciated response.Im not bashing United Way, but it would be nice to know.If they do, and even if you were to designate where your contribution goes, you would still be indirectly supporting anti-gun groups, as your contribution would free up other funds to be distributed as they see fit.

bolt,
Thats the easy part of knowing where the money goes, the 90%.Its the other 10% that we need to know about. BTW, they dont get any of my money, my contributions ony go to places where I can see it work,

"What The_Beer_Slayer said."

Why waste money on overhead when you can donate directly to a charity?

And why get involved with a group that pressures you to force EVERYONE at your company to donate to it?

Personally, I give to causes that I know will use the money in a way that I like.  I don't give to some random umbrella group that will burn over 80% on their own salaries and dinner, er, "fundraising" parties, then send 80% of the rest to groups that waste 80% more of what they're given. . . .

If you want to set up a matching-gift program, do it, but don't waste your money on the United Way.

When I was in the Boy Scouts in the '70's I remember Dad, who was Scoutmaster, fighting with them, along with the other Scoutmasters in town.

United Way would collect money in our town and wanted to send it to the council office. Dad, et.al. fought them to get it distributed directly to the local troops. It was quite the deal. And I know our troops got a piddlen' of nothing from the bastards.

I never give to them. [-!-]

A helicopter manufacturer in Florida I worked for had a United Way program that you could have an automatic deduction from your pay check.  Management heavily encouraged everyone to donate.  I remember that hundreds of thousands were donated by the employees of this company.  One year the United Way sent a representative to solicit for additional donations. Part of the presentation was a film, the rest was this rep talking.  It was nothing but an attempted guilt trip.  The presenter was nearly threatening everyone in the room.  I immediately filled out my Unite Way form and changed the 2% I was giving to 0%.  Several other people did the same.  Was incredible.  Now, any contributions I give go through my church to programs that I choose.  It's the only way to do it.

They had a big expose on this on 60 minutes.  United way was the WORSTE national charity.  Less than ten cents of every dollar made it to a recipient.  That's pretty bad considering $.25 of every welfare dollar collected makes it to a welfare recipient.

Less efficient by 3X compared to the Federal Government?

No way, send your $ to a LOCAL charity or church fund.

The big watch group of charities says that 90% of all monies collected should go to recipients or programs.  The Susan G. Komen Breast Cancer Foundation for example has a 6% operating expense rate compared to united way's 90%+ expense ratio.

When management gets to arm-twisting, I give some money but I specify that it must go to the [b]NRA Foundation[/b]. Ask them and they will tell you what the number is.

I give my charitable contributions to the largest charitable organization in the world: [size=4]The US Government[/size=4]

I worked for an organization where the Human Resources Manager was also the chairman for the county too. He was very key on making sure that everyone in the company would donate. When I first joined, I wasn't going donate anything because I was also kind of ticked off over the Boy Scouts (my group was forced to shut down over cash problems) and I had just gotten out of  college and I was in debt over my head. Well, the end of the week approached and my boss asked me where my form was. I told him I wasn't going to participate. I was then pulled into his office and told that if I didn't, I would not recieve the usual pay increase for that year. Seems as if your raise was very closely associated with your donations to the United Way since the HR Manager always had last signoff on all the raises and could adjust them to his liking or they would just magically disappear sometimes. I really didn't believe it at first till I was presented with some evidence that backed it up, namely a former employee's review sheet where for 4 years, his raises were downgraded significantly from what his boss had approved by no other that the HR manager.
From that day till I left, I donated under protest. Funny, we never had any of the fund drives there, it was "expected". Since then I have refused politly every time it comes around.
I don't even go to the drives when they are around. I can't be bribed by punch and cookies.