The article at the end of this post got me thinking about the whole issue of fund-raising and how we spend our time and effort on activities (such as collecting box tops) to raise money for a favored institution. If we really thought things through, would we intentionally choose to support our causes by doing this type of thing?
Let’s look at the specific program discussed in the article: the use of various cutouts (box tops, bar codes, etc.) from certain products to be turned in to the company making the product in return for a certain amount of money per cutout. The article says that the refunds/reimbursements range from about “5 cents to 38 cents.” So it seems fair to take the midpoint of that range for my discussion, around 20 cents.