Giving Tuesday 2022: Matching Donations and Finding the Right Charity

Tuesday, November 29th is Giving Tuesday 2022, an international day about giving support through charities and nonprofits by donating money or volunteering your time. In case you aren’t inundated with mailings already, this time of year is a big deal for charities, with 40% of donations occurring in the last six weeks of the year. Here are some ways you can “double your impact” with a matching donation.

Facebook/Meta Match. Facebook has again committed $7 million towards matching donations, but they have changed up their criteria this year. The match is only good for a recurring donation. You must sign up for a recurring donation at a charity via their Facebook page between November 15, 2022 and December 31, 2022. Then, after you make your second donation, Meta will match it up to $100.

Double Up Drive (delayed until 12/6/22). Check out the vetted, spotlighted charities at Double Up Drive where your donation up to $10,000 can be matched dollar-for-dollar:

At Double Up Drive, we believe that public giving influences greater generosity and that resulting donations carry more impact. We raise money and awareness for highly effective charities by hosting matching drives that collect up-front pledges from large donors, to provide 1:1 matches for smaller contributors.

Note that this year the drive has been delayed until Tuesday, December 6th:

Due to an unexpected last-minute and critical bug, we have decided to delay our 2022 Match Drive until Tuesday the 6th of December.

Check for an employer match. Try this lookup tool from DoubleTheDonation. Most of these programs don’t require you to actually give on a specific day, but you may want to start the process today so you don’t forget in the holiday rush.

Individual charities. Many charities are organizing their own matching program for #GivingTuesday. Here are some large charities have organized their own matches in the past, but I would check to make sure.

• Feeding America*
• UNICEF USA
• American Red Cross

* Side note: If you are an economics geek, check out this paper on how Feeding America used markets to allocate donated food:

Feeding America allocates about 300 million pounds of food a year to over two hundred food banks across the United States. It does so in an unusual way: in 2005, it switched from a centralized queuing system, where food banks would wait their turn, to a market-based mechanism where they bid daily on truckloads of food using a “fake” currency called shares.

Of course, this is a great time to check in with your favorite local community nonprofits. GivingTuesday.org has some additional ideas.

Having trouble deciding where to give? Here are some charity comparison sites that will help you pick where to send your help.

• CharityNavigator – Largest and well-publicized charity rating site, provides a 4-star rating based primarily on financial criteria.
• GiveWell – Tries to identify the best charities, not rate them all. Focused primarily on charities working internationally that “save or improve lives the most per dollar”. Examples are treating malaria and parasitic infections in developing countries.
• GreatNonProfits – Allows clients, volunteers, and funders to post personal reviews based on their experiences. Lots of reviews of smaller, local charities.
• GuideStar – Tries to be a one-stop shop for both financial data and in-depth analysis of charities. Must register (free) to see a lot of things, and pay a subscription fee for premium data (aimed at industry insiders).

Looking to volunteer your time? Check out Feeding America and VolunteerMatch to find a volunteer opportunity near you.