The Best Gifts You Can Give

Wondering what to give friends and relatives this holiday season? Here are ideas for gifts that change lives.

For 15 years I’ve offered annual holiday suggestions for gifts of meaning, and this year the three nonprofits I suggest are my greatest hits — those that I previously recommended that raised the most in reader donations.

This is also a milestone because I’m joining forces with what used to be called The New York Times Neediest Cases Fund, founded more than a century ago so the newspaper and readers could together help people struggling during the holiday season. We’ve reinvented it as The New York Times Communities Fund, and the three nonprofits on my list will also be on the roster supported by the Communities Fund. Our joint aim is to encourage more donations based on rigorous evidence of effectiveness for readers who seek to donate money as intelligently as they earn it.