Cell phone solicitations?

Before the class presentation I hadn’t thought about soliciting donations via text messages.  I think it’s a great idea as long as people sign up for it.  If it become like telemarketing except through text messages I think it would deter donations rather than elicited them.  Everyone hates getting those phone calls from telemarketers and I’d hate to see that happen to non-profits too.  As I said in class, I’d be afraid it would be a Pandora’s Box and then we really would get unwanted solicitations via text messages, which I would hate.  So if people choose whether or not to be included on the list, I think it’s a wonderful idea and I think non-profits should pursue it as long as the phone companies don’t take away too much of the money.

Tax Exemptions

So after reading a number of posts on this topic, I’ve decided I don’t necessarily believe people, who donate money, should receive a tax break. I mean, why do people need a reward for donating money? After all, it was their decision to do so. Must there always be an incentive other than a “warm fuzzy feeling” to persuade donors into giving money to charities?

I guess I don’t necessarily think tax deductibles are bad things, but do we really need them? I wonder… How much of a change do you think there would be in donations to non-profit organizations if people didn’t receive tax deductions for their contribution? Just wondering, but it kind of makes me consider how “giving” we really are. After all, everything charity related seems to have some sort of materialistic incentive to doing good more times than not. Someone discussed the charities we used to do as children earlier in the posts. I realize that some like the Salvation Army were truly “giving” without a materialistic incentive, but usually the charities did have some sort of reward like pizza parties or ice cream socials for the biggest collectors/donors.  It’s really surprising to me that we’ve been expecting rewards for giving since we were young.  Do you think it was wrong of our mentors/teachers to bribe us with these rewards? Did it send the wrong message? or was it harmless? I can’t lie to myself, I did enjoy the pizza.