This Planet Money / This American Life collaboration explores a novel idea in combating poverty: Simply giving money to poor people, with no strings attached. The experimental charity Give Directly sounds promising — even contrasted with Heifer International’s very successful model — and recently received a big check by Google.
Listen
“Money for Nothing and Your Cows for Free” — act two from This American Life’s episode 503, “I Was Just Trying to Help”. (The story auto plays when you click the link.)