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WOMEN'S
FUND OF
MISSISSIPPI UPDATE
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E-News for the Week of September 2,
2010
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Is there a
"compassion deficit" in philanthropy? (New York
Times)
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In
2001, Independent Sector, a nonprofit organization focused on
charitable giving, found that households earning less than $25,000
a year gave away an average of 4.2 percent of their incomes; those
with earnings of more than $75,000 gave away 2.7 percent. Empathy
and compassion appeared to be the key ingredients in the greater
generosity of those with lower incomes. And these two traits proved
to be in increasingly short supply as people moved up the income
spectrum.
Research has found that if higher-income people were instructed to
imagine themselves as lower class, they became more charitable. If
they were primed by, say, watching a sympathy-eliciting video, they
became more helpful to others - so much so, in fact, that the
difference between their behavior and that of the low-income
subjects disappeared. And fascinatingly, the inverse was true as
well: when lower-income people were led to think of themselves as
upper class, they actually became less altruistic.
Read Full Article
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Can three not
-always-easy steps end poverty? (Baltimore
Sun)
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Complete
high school, work full-time, and wait until you're over 21 and
married to have children. Researchers Isabell Sawhill and Ron
Haskins have found that if someone does all three of those things,
their risk of being in poverty is only 2%.They are quick to point
out that other factors also play a role (like the economy) but that
reducing the poverty rate is a combination of government assistance
and encouragement to exercise personal responsibility.
Read Full
Article |
Payday
lending is a debt trap for 91% of all customers
(Change.org)
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This
article explains the typical problem with a payday loan is the fact
that the loan plus the fee is due in two weeks. Most borrowers,
because they already have a hole in their budget, cannot afford to
pay the loan back in full and still make it to their next
paycheck.
While the industry claims that its product is intended to help
people get past the occasional financial emergency, repeat "serial"
borrowing (five or more payday loans per year) accounts for 91
percent of all payday loans. Only two percent of payday borrowers
who take out a loan don't come back within a year for another loan.
According to the Center for Responsible Lending, a two-digit
interest rate cap is already saving residents in 15 states and the
District of Columbia nearly $1.8 billion in predatory payday fees
alone.
Read
Full Article |
"Three Cups of
Tea" author says change takes patience in Afghanistan (Philadelphia
Inquirer)
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"Success
in Afghanistan," Mortenson says, will come "when the people
themselves can determine their own destiny. Mortenson puts that
philosophy to work in Afghanistan, working with shuras (groups of
elders). Their deepest wish is to be free from coercion, by Taliban
or corrupt central government officials, and to be able to improve
their lives. Prime among their concerns is educating their
children. If local mullahs are resistant to approving girls'
education, they can usually be convinced over more cups of
tea.
Mortenson says he believes education can change Afghan society.
Indeed, since the Taliban were defeated, the number of Afghan
schoolkids had risen from 800,000 to 8 million, including 2.8
million girls.
"If something is so successful, why aren't we putting more money
into it?" he asks. He says the U.S. country spends $1 million per
year per soldier in Afghanistan. Their higher-education ministry
needs $247 million to refurbish a struggling system, but the
ministry will only get about $50 million. "For the cost of 247 U.S.
soldiers," he says, "we could pay for the whole
thing."
Read
Full Article |
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Our
Mission:
The Women's Fund
of Mississippi is dedicated to improving the lives of women and
families in communities across the state by promoting social change
and economic self-sufficiency through advocacy and strategic
grantmaking. |
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