When I contribute to charity, it's usually to avoid feeling guilty rather than to feel good as such... imagining myself as being the guy who doesn't rescue a drowning swimmer because he doesn't want to get his suit wet isn't a state I want to be in.

These charities can save someone's life for about $1,000. If you spend $1,000 on anything else, you've as good as sentenced someone to death. I find this to be really disturbing, and thinking about it makes think about doing crazy things, such as spending my $20,000 savings on a ten year term life insurance policy worth $10,000,000 and then killing myself and leaving the money to charity. At $1,000 a life, that's ten thousand lives saved. I suspect that most people who literally give their lives for others don't get that kind of return on investment.