To answer the OP's question 2 in more depth, any of the charities recommended there would be excellent candidates: GiveDirectly and the two deworming charities (which you pick will depend on which is tax-deductible in your country). GiveDirectly is certain transparent and efficient, in that it simply gives a large unconditional cash transfer to poor families, with around 90% 'efficiency' in the sense that 90% of your money ends up in their pocket. See this accessible introduction and this detailed analysis.
About a year and a half ago, I made a donation to the Against Malaria Foundation. This was during jkaufman's generous matching offer.
That was 20 months ago, and my money is still in the "underwriting" phase - funding projects that are still, of yet, just plans and no nets.
Now, the AMF has had a reasonable reason it was taking longer than expected:
"A provisional, large distribution in a province of the [Democratic Republic of the Congo] will not proceed as the distribution agent was unable to agree to the process requested by AMF during the timeframe needed by our co-funding partner."
So they've hit a snag, the earlier project fell through, and they are only now allocating my money to a new project. Don't get me wrong, I am very glad they are telling me where my money is going, and especially glad it didn't just end up in someone's pocket instead. With that said, though, I still must come to this conclusion:
The AMF seems to have more money than they can use, right now.
So, LW, I have the following questions: