Weekend Link Roundup (September 29-30, 2018)

A weekly roundup of noteworthy items from and about the social sector. For more links to great content, follow us on Twitter at @pndblog....

Corporate Social Responsibility

As we've seen after other natural disasters recently, U.S. corporations and companies are stepping up to help the folks in the Carolinas who've been affected by flooding caused by Hurricane Florence. On a related note, Business Insider's Chelsea Greenwood has compiled a list of the ten companies that gave the most to charity in 2017.

The Forbes Business Development Council shares some good advice for small business looking to be charitable. 

Economy

Sso-called gig work promises a measure of flexiblity and independence that traditional jobs don't. But the pay is lousy, and people are starting to figure that out. A new report from the JPMorgan Chase Institute offers three sobering conclusions about the gig economy. Christopher Rugaber reports for the AP.

Health

How can we reverse the obesity epidemic? Washington Post contributor Tamar Haspel shares six commonsense suggestions.

International Affairs/Development

The world has made excellent progress in reducing poverty over the last twenty-five years, write Bill and Melinda Gates in an opinion piece for the New York Times. But thanks to "the unfortunate intersection of two demographic trends," that progress could stall, or even be reversed, if appropriate action is not taken.

Nonprofits

In Forbes, Ben Paynter shares findings from a new report issued by Fidelity Charitable which suggest that nonprofits should be doing more to court entrepreneurs as donors.

On the Guidestar blog, Becca Bennett and Jordan Ritchie offer some guidelines designed to help nonprofits get the most from their boards.

It's a crazy world we live in, and sometimes the best way to respond to it is to give ourselves a break. Social Velocity's Nell Edgington explains why it's important and what you can do to defeat that voice in your head which keeps whispering, "Don't even think about."

Grantmaking

On the Center for Effective Philanthropy blog, Rodney Christopher, a senior consultant at FMA, has a friendly suggestion for foundation presidents, trustees, and program officers who are interested in boosting the impact of their organization's grantmaking: Spend a day shadowing the CEO of one of your grantee organizations.

Philanthropy

The recent announcement by Jeff Bezos that he and his wife are committing $2 billion of their vast fortune to start a philanthropic fund focused on on helping homeless families and starting preschools in low-income communities has sparked an outpouring of commentary — pro and con. But in a world in which the richest one percent of the global population has accumulated more than 50 percent of the world's total wealth and the combined wealth of the nine richest people in the world is greater than that of the four billion poorest, we don't need another "billionaire hero," writes the editorial team at Boss Magazine — we need every billionaire to step up and start giving. 

The flip side of that coin, according to Una Osili, professor of economics and associate dean for research and international programs at the Indiana University Lilly Family School of Philanthropy, is that everyone can give back by volunteering. Indeed, in the twenty-first century, Osili writes in the Indianapolis Business Journal, volunteering "is a crucial component of inclusive civic engagement in which all individuals have a role to play in advancing the public good."

The HistPhil blog is well into a forum on the recently released second edition of Paul Brest's and Hal Harvey's Money Well Spent. HistPhil co-editor Maribel Morey introduces the forum in this post, and Brest and Harvey weigh in with a post of their own. There are also excellent contributions from Lily Geismer, David C. Hammack, and Morey (her second)

And what are the questions foundation boards should be asking the CEOs who report to them? Philanthropy 411's Kris Putnam-Walkerly shares six good ones.

(Photo credit: Getty Images)

That's it for this week. Got something you'd like to share? Drop us a note at mfn@foundationcenter.org.