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What are donor-advised funds – and what’s the problem with them?

DAFs channel huge amounts of cash to ‘culture war’ groups – anonymously. Why do people get tax breaks for using them?

What are donor-advised funds – and what’s the problem with them?
Published:

US law lets wealthy people get substantial tax deductions if they donate to charitable organisations.

If you’re really, really rich, your income tax can run into tens or even hundreds of millions of dollars. Charitable giving is recognised as a public good, and so the US government rewards donors by slashing their tax bills – sometimes, in the right circumstances, almost completely. It can even work out more beneficial in the long run to donate assets to charity than it can to sell them.

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