After having her first child in 2010, wealth adviser Louise Pfeiffer made a big decision. "Significant life events have a habit of making you more open to making changes," she says. "After Sebastian was born, my partner Phil and I became more acutely aware of the suffering in the world and decided to become effective altruists."
Spurred on by reading Peter Singer's The Life You Can Save, Adelaide-based Pfeiffer committed to giving a percentage of her household income to charity and deliberately chose a career that would enable her to "earn to give".
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"I specifically chose my career because you can earn above average," she says. "Phil and I thought hard about our careers, our personalities, our life stage and the best return we could get in terms of maximising what we give."
Pfeiffer, 39, has also set up a financial advisory practice with the view to selling it in 10 years, and donating 20 per cent of the proceeds to charity.
She applies her business acumen to ensure each giving dollar goes the farthest it can, and uses research house GiveWell to guide her donations. "I'm always asking how I can get the biggest return for my giving dollar," she says. "We ask that question with financial investments, so why not with giving as well?"
Pfeiffer's goal was to give $100,000 by 2020 and is going to hit the target this financial year. This is impressive given that for the 2012-17 financial years her average household earnings were around $160,000. "We now give up to 20 per cent of our annual income," Pfeiffer says. "But I think we could still give more."
Earning to give has provided Pfeiffer with a tangible way to make a difference. "I feel like our life has a lot more purpose since we started giving regularly," she says. "It is motivating going to work knowing that we are going to be able to give more."
People's sense of satisfaction and purpose in giving is something Regina Hill sees regularly as director of effective philanthropy, a social research organisation. While people tend to give in different ways, Hill says people usually choose causes with a personal connection.
![Adelaide-based wealth adviser Louise Pfeiffer, 39, has chosen a career and business that will maximise her ability to ...](/web/20170505000021im_/http://www.theage.com.au/content/dam/images/g/v/w/a/2/6/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gvw5z9.png/1493735256178.jpg)
"Living one's purpose is a strong pull for most people to give," Hill says. "People tend to give based on something that has had a personal impact."
This is the case for Mike Dowling, chief executive and owner of James' Home Services based in the Gold Coast in Queensland. Dowling sought a high paying job so he could donate more. Dowling, 60, had a "pretty tough upbringing" and focuses his philanthropy on helping children.
![Mike Dowling, chief executive and owner of James' Home Services on the Gold Coast, estimates he has given about half a ...](/web/20170505000021im_/http://www.theage.com.au/content/dam/images/g/v/w/a/v/4/image.related.articleLeadNarrow.300x0.gvw5z9.png/1493735256178.jpg)
"I know what it is like to struggle as a child," Dowling says. "Now that I am doing well I want to help those in need."
In the past 12 months, Dowling has donated $300,000, and over the past five years he estimates he has given half a million dollars away. "My donations have been a large percentage of my income but I am happy to do it," Dowling says.
For a business owner like Dowling, the decision of earning to give has been simple. "I've always been in my own business so this has meant that I make all the decisions," he says. "I have the freedom to help others when I want to."
Others, however, seek advice in choosing a career that can make a high social impact. 80,000 Hours is an Oxford-based organisation that encourages people to use evidence to select careers that will make a positive impact as well as a high level of personal fit.
The organisation is based on the premise that we spend 80,000 hours of our life at work: 40 hours a week, 50 weeks a year, for 40 years. "Choosing how you spend that time is one of the most important decisions you'll ever make," says director of coaching, Peter McIntyre.
For McIntyre, carefully choosing a career for maximum impact means leading an interesting and rewarding life, but also being able to contribute to solving the world's most urgent problems.
"If someone told me they'd saved a person from drowning one year, from a burning building the next, and taken a bullet for someone the year after, I'd think they'd been living this incredible life," says McIntyre. "Our research has shown the average university graduate can do at least this much good. And many will be in a position where they can do much more than this. That's a truly extraordinary opportunity."
It's an opportunity that 24-year-old Michael Dello-Iacovo has embraced wholeheartedly. After completing his undergraduate geophysics degree and working for two years, with an oil and gas company, Dello-Iacovo no longer felt connected to the work and culture.
"I heard about 80,000 Hours and met one of the coaches there," he says. After considering different high impact career options, Dello-Iacovo decided to pursue a PhD in planetary science. He is currently completing a year of that in Los Angeles.
"Last year I took another pledge to give everything I earn over $45,000 each year for the rest of my life," Dello-Iacovo says. "I probably won't be able to pay off a mortgage, but I think people buy lots of things they don't need. You can still have a high quality of life on relatively little."
Dello-Iacovo has already donated $75,000 and is excited about his philanthropic future. "It gives me so much pleasure to know the impact of my giving," he says. "Every time I give $6000 to Against Malaria, it's the equivalent of saving one human life. That's a pretty amazing feeling."