Summer Lunchin': Slate Snarks on Simpson

We’re late to the party on this one. Many of you have already emailed us this Slate piece, in which Daniel Gross goes to town on Simpson Thacher’s “Chow for Charity” program. Article title: “Fifteen Dollars Worth of Smug.”
We first read about Simpson’s program in this great New York Observer article:

[A]t Simpson Thacher & Bartlett, there’s a program called Chow for Charity: If summers and associates go out for a lunch that costs $15 or less per head, the firm donates the other $45 of each person’s lunch allowance to charities including Legal Aid, inMotion and Human Rights First.

For some, this is an appealing option: “It’s great for [the firms] to be able to say, ‘We realize these $60 meals are sort of stupid, so we give money to something good and everyone is happier,'” says an associate. Noblesse oblige never tasted so much like falafel!

The program is also discussed in the New York Times (fourth item) and the WSJ Law Blog.
What do you think of “Chow for Charity”? Take our poll, and opine in the comments, after the jump.


Fifteen Dollars’ Worth of Smug [Slate]
Lunch and a Cause [New York Times]
My Very Special Summer [New York Observer]
Simpson’s “Chow for Charity”: Corporate Greed or Good? [WSJ Law Blog]

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