Danielle Levy

I am struck by a recent piece by NYT Economic Scene Columnist Eduardo Porter in which he raised the issue of “ how much should we rely on the private sector to satisfy broad social needs?” It’s a profound question, and one at the core of our political divisions. If we can make use of it, we might be in a better position to resolve many of our current issues, in health care, in education or in the delivery of public services. The piece is titled “Health Care and Profits, a Poor Mix” and he cites studies and cases where non-profit nursing homes and hospitals converted to be for-profit institutions. Patient care declined and in some cases increased mortality, apparently influenced by lower staffing levels. According to Porter, the U.S. relies on the private sector to deliver essential public services far more than other industrial nations. Pensions and bail bondsmen are examples. It stems, he says from a “more narrow understanding of our collective responsibility to provide social goods.” He goes on to discuss that our trust in private enterprise may be “undeserved” since the track record evidence does not support it, and he then raises the issue of how the profit motive, especially in health care, interferes with the quality and delivery of those services. It’s an argument that merits far more attention than we are inclined to give it.

To no one’s surprise Warren Buffet was 2012 biggest donor, giving $1 billion to each of the foundations run by his children. Outside of Mr. Buffet’s the biggest gifts for that year totaled $2 billion. In 2011 the total was $2.6 billion. By contrast there were more gifts of $1 million or more, totaling $6.1 billion when that figure was $5.4 billion the year before. Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook was the biggest donor after Warren Buffet, giving $498.8 million in stock to the Silicon Valley Community foundation. Paul Allen of Microsoft gave $300 million to the Allen Institute for Brain Science and publisher Morton Zuckerman gave $200 million to Columbia’s Mind Brain Behavior Institute. Perhaps I am more biased than I am aware of, but outside of Warren Buffet who has long been a dedicated philanthropist, I am not impressed. With a struggling economy with many still unemployed or underemployed, when those at the top of the economic ladder have prospered much more than the rest of us, it seems those with wealth are giving back some of what the society enabled them to receive. As such I am willing to grant their giving fulfilled a civic duty, maybe one not meriting particular gratitude, but one that is nevertheless important.

UCLA finished a first, its first class in philanthropy where several students were charged to give away $100,000. It was an opportunity for them to study the non-profit sector in the Los Angeles area, and decide how to spend this money. They were to make grants for no less than $10,000 and no more than $50,00, all donated by the Texas based Once Upon a Time Foundation which has sponsored similar classes at Harvard, Yale, Stanford, the University of Michigan and the University of Texas. The goal was to better understand the nature of philanthropy and how it can be relevant in a complex urban environment with varying needs. On the one hand a class in philanthropy seems sad. Contributing should come from the heart and help us help others perhaps supporting causes which are related to our interests. On the other such a class institutionalizes giving, and makes it a thoughtful exercise. It doesn’t interfere with giving from the heart nor with supporting the causes one believes in. Anything that makes us include the needs of others and try to answer them is not only important, it is also necessary, and maybe such a class will become part of standard curriculum in all universities.