TL;DR: I took the 🔸10% Pledge in 2016 and haven’t kept to it consistently. I’ve decided not to pay the backlog donations, and instead to recommit fresh from today, with simple systems to keep me on track. Sharing this for transparency and in the hope it may be helpful to others
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Why I’m posting
In 2016, as a university student, I took the Giving What We Can 10% Pledge. I made my pledge publicly, and my social media profiles show the 🔸10% Pledge badge. For integrity’s sake, I want to be equally public that I fell short—and explain how I’m handling that going forward.
What happened
Over time I lost track of my giving while navigating some challenges in my health, personal and work life, and I stopped donating. I also didn’t keep to the “1% while unemployed” principle. In total, I’ve given about half of what I pledged since 2016.
Looking back, I think giving annually rather than monthly played a part in my falling short — a few times I reached December and realised I’d already spent what I’d meant to donate. So I was accumulating ‘pledged donation debt’, which made it harder to keep up.
There were also moments when I told myself that using funds to sustain myself (e.g., trying mission-aligned work with lower pay or no pay; dealing with health challenges) might be “indirectly effective.” That may have been partly true, and partly motivated reasoning. Either way, the result is that I didn’t meet the commitment I publicly made.
I’m sorry for displaying the 🔸10% Pledge badge while not living up to it.
Going forward
I’ve decided to wipe the slate clean on the backlog rather than trying to repay historic shortfalls, and to recommit from today. For me, this best balances two aims:
- Keeping the spirit of the pledge (giving regularly and meaningfully from what I have), and
- Avoiding shame/punishment that could make me disengage further.
I recognise reasonable people may disagree or do this differently. If you think I’m being too lenient on myself, I understand that view. I’m sharing this because I value transparency, not because I think this is the correct approach.
I’m recommitting, with systems I hope will help me keep up this time. What will this look like, concretely?
- Restart today. I’m officially ‘recommitting’ to giving 10% of my income until I retire (1% of spending money while not earning).
- Automate. I'll set up a recurring donation or use payroll giving (if available), so I won't forget.
- Monthly donations. No more end-of-year lump sums (to reduce the chance that I already spent the money!)
- Plan better. I’ll pay more attention to financial planning, budgeting for my post-donation salary.
- Claim Gift Aid*. Carefully understand when Gift Aid is applicable and claim when appropriate. (Gift Aid counts towards the pledge.)
If you’ve been in a similar situation, I hope this post helps you to know you’re not the only one! And if your conclusion differs from mine, that’s okay.
Thanks for reading.
*Gift Aid is a UK scheme that lets charities claim an extra 25% on donations from taxpayers, at no extra cost to the donor.
Starting afresh seems like the right move here, and I think it's super commendable to share that you're re-committing.
I have the same problem when it comes to end of year donations, and that prompted me to move to monthly donations (even if the idealized version of me would save accordingly and then make bigger donations more thoughtfully EOY).
Also:
This is still a lot of money, and a lot of good. Giving 5% of your income to charity for almost 10 years is a hugely generous and selfless thing to do :)
A vulnerable post like this was well worth sharing. I'm sure it wasn't easy to open up about this, but I bet many others can relate. I like the idea of re-committing vs. trying to make up for years of backfall - which may likely lead to more stress and an "all-or-nothing" mindset that may cause you to circle the drain.
I think your point about donating monthly and making your giving more of a consistent habit is important. When it comes to planning, have you considered any other resources to keep up the habit? Some simple ideas that could help:
Just to add my personal experience, if you might be planning direct work, especially entrepreneurship and/or might want to have children - a personal runway has served me well. Not sure if this is stretching the "giving 10%" too far, but you could mentally consider it donated and in case you don't need it later, you can donate it then. I think at least 12 months of runway at your anticipated future expenses might be the right level (so not a student expense, but if you might want children, accounting for all related expenses). Another situation that could make donations more challenging is if you move cities/countries for your job and thus might incur extra expenses from travelling to see loved ones. Especially with things getting weird geopolitically and with AI, I think now might be a good time to consider "donating to flexibility". That said, I think more strict donation pledges are highly commendable but for me it has meant I operated with lower runway than might have been ideal.