California · Nonprofit
The Life You Can Save
The Life You Can Save (California) receives grants from 73 organizations whose IRS filings report $21,749,456 to it, the largest being NETWORK FOR GOOD ($5,673,452). 36 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 75% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
- Revenue FY2024
- $11M
- Funders on record
- 73
- Grants received
- $22M
- Net assets
- $1.5M
What The Life You Can Save does
Mission
The Life You Can Save's mission is to improve the lives of people living in poverty by changing the way people think about, and donate to charity. Our vision is to live in a world where there is no global poverty.
As stated on its FY2024 Form 990.
Program
RASING FUNDS FOR EFFECTIVE CHARITIES: In 2024, we directly processed US $9.9M for our recommended charities as agency funds. In addition to donations directly processed by our organization, we inspired donors to give large amounts either directly to our recommended charities themselves or through other mission aligned organization. Globally we estimate that we either directly raised or inspired US $20.3M in donations to effective charities (Our "Total Money Moved" Metric).
$10,125,007 spentof which $9,913,028 as grants$9,913,218 earned by the program100% of program spending
The program described on its FY2024 Form 990. Program spending in total: $10,125,007.
The organization over time
Each line starts at 100 in 2020, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2020, 50 means half. The number beside each label in the key is where it ended. The shaded band is where the middle 50% of its peers' revenue would sit, given their growth.
Balance sheet
Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2020 to 2021, from $3.4M to $5.3M (+57%).
How it's funded, over time
Each bar is one year's revenue split into where it came from, and every bar is the same height — these are shares, not amounts, so a year that raised twice as much looks the same size. Hover a bar for the split.
99% of The Life You Can Save’s revenue is contributions — more reliant on donations than three-quarters of its peers (80% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 4 of the last 5 reported years ran a deficit.
reserve
Leadership and staff
The officers, directors, trustees and key employees listed on each return. Joined and no longer listed compare each filing with the year before, matching people by surname and first initial; a year after a gap, or a roster under three people, has no comparison.
The chief executive listed changed between the FY2020 and FY2021 filings.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 2 funders to 27 funders, grant income rose $57k → $4.1M.
23 of 73 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 75% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.
From the IRS filings of The Life You Can Save’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 73 funders by total. Association, not causation. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How concentrated its funding is
The Life You Can Save has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 26% of grant income, and it takes 4 funders to reach half.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 4 funders to its left
92% of the income these shares are computed over arrives through pass-through sponsors or from payers whose filings do not say what kind of payment it is. Concentration is still measured over all of it, because the money is real; what it does not support is a claim about how many institutions have chosen to fund The Life You Can Save.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 69% · 2018 36% · 2019 30% · 2020 55% · 2021 46% · 2022 43% · 2023 38% — diversifying over time.
“Effective funders” = inverse Herfindahl index (1 / Σ shareᵢ²) — the number of equal-sized funders that would give the same concentration. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How long its funders stay
57% of The Life You Can Save's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 49% give in more than one year at all.
Share of funders still giving k years after their first recorded grant, pooled across every acquisition cohort. A funder counts as retained in a year only if it made a grant that year. Measured to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving — a funder cannot be counted as lapsed in a year most filers have not reached.
Where its funders are
75% of The Life You Can Save's grant income arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors, whose addresses record where the money is held rather than where the donor is. Of the $5.5M that is directly attributable, 90% of it comes from funders outside California, across 18 states.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $16M arriving through sponsors registered in 16 states is excluded from the map and the split above: a sponsor holds money on a donor’s behalf, so its registered address would place those dollars somewhere no donor need ever have been. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
Against its field
The Life You Can Save has grown faster than three-quarters of the 828 philanthropy nonprofits its size.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 828 philanthropy nonprofits $10M–$100M, FY2024
Government funding The Life You Can Save receives
Grants and contracts to this organization from federal (USASpending) and state checkbooks, reconciled to its EIN. $189 on record.
- REFUNDS - GENERAL $189
Federal grants vs contracts are distinguished; state line items keep their reported category. Matched by name + geography (the BMF), so coverage is partial and precision-first.
Organizations like The Life You Can Save
Organizations whose mission and program text most resemble this one, by semantic similarity over every organization in the US filings — the closest peers, and often the clearest route to shared or prospective funders.
In California
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
89% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
97%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for The Life You Can Save: IRS status (Business Master File, Publication 78, auto-revocation), the OFAC sanctions lists, the Internal Revenue Bulletin, and California registration, with the Rev. Proc. 2018-32 §8.01 reliance elements stated element by element. Generated from the current files at the moment you download it.
Screens are triage, not determinations; a source that cannot be read reports not screened, never clear. Screen this nonprofit · How the screen works · on the API as GET /api/screening/{ein}?format=pdf
Questions and answers
- Who funds The Life You Can Save?
- The Life You Can Save (California) receives grants from 73 organizations whose IRS filings report $21,749,456 to it, the largest being NETWORK FOR GOOD ($5,673,452). 36 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 75% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
- How many funders does The Life You Can Save have?
- IRS filings report 73 organizations giving $21,749,456 in grants to The Life You Can Save, 36 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of The Life You Can Save?
- NETWORK FOR GOOD is the largest funder on record, with $5,673,452 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like The Life You Can Save find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in California. The funding by cause and by state pages list the largest funders for a given area and how to approach them.
These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2024 (financials across 2020–2024), and the filings of 73 funders that report grants to it. “On record” means captured in the filings we have parsed — a funder that does not e-file, or whose grant detail is not itemized, will not appear. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind. Trends on this page end at FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving; later years are shown and marked, and move no figure. Data on this page was exported October 14, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing