PETER DRUCKER'S PICKS

There are more than 600,000 charitable organizations in the U.S. - all clamoring for your money.  Universities, hospitals, museums, symphony orchestras, church groups, medical research, food for the hungry.

Americans do respond.  They gave away $120 billion in 1996.

Was it wisely given? We turned to Peter Drucker for an answer.  Best known as a management expert, Drucker has been working with the nonprofit sector for decades.  He knows the good ones and the not-so-solid ones.

Drucker calls the nonprofits the "social sector" of the American economy.   He is a fervent believer in the importance of this sector at a time when social wants and needs are many and most government programs are costly, self-defeating failures.  That these nonprofits be well managed is, in Drucker's view, as important as the private sector be well managed.

Those are his principal criteria ...

Drucker says the Salvation Army qualifies on all grounds.  And when it comes to measuring results, it has one of the highest performance rates at the lowest cost.

One of every four participants in its alcohol rehabilitation program reports 

Last year 5 million individuals, mostly single-parent families, were placed in transitional housing by the Salvation Army.  After placement, the Army helps them find work and permanent housing.

"They know how to work with the poorest of the poor and the meanest of the mean," says Drucker.