When you give to charity, you feel good, right? Sometimes people act in ways that are not directly in their own best interest, and it’s a beautiful part of human nature. But there are also human beings who are, at some level, evil. They come in all walks of life, and, unfortunately, many of them have ended up in the charity business. Some may even do legitimate charity work to make it look sincere. But then they pay themselves with your money when no one is looking. They hurt overall giving because they make people skeptical about giving to organizations in the future. It’s been a problem for years and it happens, in part, because the IRS has been very lax in its standards for giving non-profit status. Basically, it’s an honor system and anyone can claim tax-exempt status. But it has become such a big business with phony charities that the IRS is going through a crack down. The agency has found a couple thousand charities that are fronts for people to siphon off money. According to the New York Times, there will now be 370 people at the IRS whose sole job is to hunt down these organizations. The first targets are the charitable organizations that pay top executives salaries of more than $1 million a year. There are apparently hundreds of them. So, it will take a while to clean up all of the scum. And, there will still be crooks out there. That’s why you need to do your homework when giving money. First of all, get to know organizations. Give to those you know about. Secondly, don’t give money over the phone. Designate one time a year to sift through all of the solicitations you’ve gotten and pick out the ones you’ll give to. Also, check out the site, give.org, which lists charities and what percentage of your money actually goes to the charity and not the administrators. You need to be your own police officer.