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Brad Edmonds at LewRockwell.com spends his Christmas Eve identifying with Ebenezer Scrooge. In this era with continual sound bites about corporate social responsibility, Edmonds suggests that “the two most charitable things you can do are start a business, and reduce government.”

Scrooge protests that Marley was a good businessman in life; and Scrooge himself is a successful businessman. This should be enough charity from them. You cannot be a successful businessman unless other people come to you willingly, and give you their money so you can do for them whatever it is that makes you such a good businessman. When good businessmen are free to be good businessmen (and customers are free to be their own watchdogs against any businessman’s greed), everyone benefits: Customers get better service, and lower prices. Businessmen are allowed to hire poor 13-year-olds after school at $2 an hour, giving the youngsters income, experience, and a work record. The businesses can then charge even lower prices, and more people have money to spend. Without onerous licensing requirements, that 13-year-old might open a business of his own when he’s 16, mowing yards, shining shoes, painting houses, or whatever. By the time he’s 30, that once-poor kid might have a thriving business, perhaps a yard-care outfit with 10 pickup trucks and 20 employees. With his experience and track record, he could compete for a job as a middle manager at any Fortune 500 company. …

A truly free market helps everyone, but it helps the poor even more than the rich. Government, in its licensing requirements, miles of red tape, taxes, and other barriers to entry, allows only those already of some means to start a business. Starting a business is a complicated, time-consuming, expensive process. Government ensures this state of affairs remains in place. The people who brought about such laws have been in every case established businessmen who wanted to use the force of government to keep out new competition. Without government assistance, businessmen would have to work harder, and would have fewer guarantees (though many more options).
[Emphasis mine]

Just running a business and providing employment does much more than giving a handout. Swaminathan Aiyar stumbled upon this when he thought of starting a charitable trust, but his

… search for a sustainable way of helping the poor had led me right back to the business class I had long looked down on. I had not started with the reasoning of Adam Smith’s invisible hand. I had started on a different route, seeking to create a visible hand to assist the poor. Yet this journey led me to the same end-point as Adam Smith’s discourse. I realised that old hate-objects like GD Birla had, by building large industrial empires, done far more to help far more poor people than any charitable trust I could create.
[Emphasis mine]

He recounts the story in The Birth of Swaminomics (pdf format). Read the whole piece. It’s an inspiring story of how a well meaning socialist saw the “light.”

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!