The tithe is a well-established Schelling point, and one that I follow. 10% Jaibot and Bride of Jaibot of income goes to GiveWell's top charities. I Use Google's one-a-day app for non-optimal warm fuzzies, and I pitch in to explicitly rationalist causes like MIRI or helping a dying person afford cryonics.
(here is where I notice Ambien kicking in. Post becomes less reliably representative of Jai from here on out.
The important thing is to measure yourself against what you are: You are a human. Humans are not very good at world optimization, when left to their own devices. They knock things over and cheat and steal - and some goof comes of it, sometimes...but if you can take actions to make life better for people, at all, you're already winning. You made the choice that almost no one else made, the choice which you amplified and echoes after you made it: "I want to help. I realy want to help. I don't mean "look busy" or "be complimented", I mean "alter the state of the world such that everyine gets the things they would want if they were better at being the sort of person I want them to gtow ::falls down::
Note from a week later: I have no memory of writing this and find it hilarious. I still endorse the general message, if not the descent into semi-madness.
I'd like to hear from people about a process they use to decide how much to give to charity. Personally, I have very high income, and while we donate significant money in absolute terms, in relative terms the amount is <1% of our post-tax income. It seems to me that it's too little, but I have no moral intuition as to what the right amount is.
I have a good intuition on how to allocate the money, so that's not a problem.
Background: I have a wife and two kids, one with significant health issues (i.e. medical bills - possibly for life), most money we spend goes to private school tuition x 2, the above mentioned medical bills, mortgage, and miscellaneous life expenses. And we max out retirement savings.
If you have some sort of quantitative system where you figure out how much to spend on charity, please share. If you just use vague feelings, and you think there can be no reasonable quantitative system, please tell me that as well.
Update: as suggested in the comments, I'll make it more explicit: please also share how you determine how much to give.