Kansas City Star: Surplus stuff stirs up charity debate
"…Some critics called a foul on the NFL-World Vision play, saying that while 100,000 brand-new T-shirts for needy people abroad sounds like a lovely idea, it actually does more harm than good.
The NFL has valued the shirts at $20 apiece, despite claims from critics that the shirts are basically unsellable and therefore essentially worthless. As a rule, World Vision does not accept donations of used clothing or other items.
“Shipping unwanted goods overseas is … not smart aid,” Saundra Schimmelpfennig wrote on her blog, Good Intentions Are Not Enough (www .goodintents.org).
“This partnership is a win-win for both World Vision and the merchandisers. The merchandisers get to print 100,000 unneeded T-shirts every year without having to shoulder the full cost, and World Vision gets $2 million worth of program costs to improve their expense ratios. And they both get free PR with photos and news stories of happy people receiving the unsellable T-shirts.”
Schimmelpfennig and other critics argue that T-shirts are readily available in most of the countries World Vision and other relief groups serve. The NFL donation will flood local marketplaces with unneeded (and unwanted, at least by U.S. consumers) goods, driving down the prices at which local merchants can sell their wares. …"
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