In this weekend’s Your Money column, I look at the common but not well-known science of prospect research. Hospitals, colleges and charitable enterprises of all sorts who want you to give them money have plenty of data available about your net worth, home and any fancy cars or boats and such.

The question is whether they’re crossing some line by buying and using it? I don’t think so, since it’s all in the name of raising more money more efficiently and not pestering people who don’t have the capacity to give.

But for you, the idea that a hospital’s patient admissions list may be cross-checked each night with a fund-raising database could cross a line, even if “high-potential” patients merely get a few extra pillows or a better meal out of it.

Your thoughts below, please.

Article source: http://feeds.nytimes.com/click.phdo?i=272e4ab8f5ceb0a1abbb776180512327