Did Harvard Almost Take Down The U.S. Economy?

An interesting read from the CENTER FOR SOCIAL PHILANTHROPY:

http://www.tellus.org/publications/files/endowmentcrisis.pdf

Check out this summary from onPhilanthropy.com, if your attention span is as short as mine:

http://onphilanthropy.com/2010/did-big-endowments-make-economic-crisis-worse/

My comment:  after years of monitoring the investments of gift annuity programs (mostly by the top planned giving admin providers), I have always been amazed at how the really good investment managers are able to limit risk, catch some market upside, and still make payouts to donors between 5% and 12% a year.  It dawned on me that endowments should be managed in similar fashion but apparently the big boys don’t agree with me.  Good luck to them!