In the nonprofit sector, there is an ideology about the amount of donated money can go to overhead. Overhead accounts for the funds used for advertising, fundraising, management, and some salaries. Within this stigma, there is also a negative view of nonprofit CEO's receiving a salary compared to the salary of a business CEO. In the past, the ratio of overhead to program costs was one of the only comparable financial ratios for nonprofits. In many ways, this was the only ratio that allowed people to see if nonprofits were fulfilling their mission. This was before the majority of nonprofits had websites and locations for donors to see exactly what impact the nonprofit was making.
Today, though, there is a changed frame of reference through increased transparency. Part of this is due to law, and the other part is because nonprofits have realized that they are more likely to get donations if they get and keep their donor base involved. For instance, charity:water is known for transparency with its donor base. Anyone can click onto charity:water's website and see exactly where donated money is going. You can click on a map and see pictures and locations of each well they drill. Additionally, all nonprofits are required to give open access to their 990's. If someone wants to donate to any organization, they have all the resources needed to make an educated decision, making sure that their money is going to a good cause.
Therefore, while there has been a change in the availability of information regarding whether a nonprofit is actually successful, people still don't want to give their money to nonprofits with a perceived large overhead. Despite seeing all the impact that a nonprofit has, funders don't want their money to go to someone's salary. The problem with this idea is that nonprofit's need successful people to run the organization and successful people don't work for free. Passion only takes you so far until you need to pay the bills.
"We have a visceral reaction to the idea that anyone would make very much money helping other people. Interestingly that we don't have a visceral reaction to people making a lot of money not helping other people. you know, you want to make $50,000,000 selling violent video games to kids, go for it... but if you want to make $50,000 trying to cure kids of malaria, you are considered a parasite yourself" (Dan Pollotta).
Therefore, people ought to take more time truly understanding a nonprofit and not just look at overhead as a way to determine whether they are successful and accomplishing their mission. Stories and pictures tell a lot more than overhead ratios.
I like your post, and it speaks toward another problem in society today that may need to be questioned. We often value people by the amount of money they make, not by the amount of good they can do. Money itself is a form of payment assumed by tradition, but when viewed from an objective viewpoint, it may not be the best way to assign value if a performer or video game developer gets paid more than someone who is actually doing good in the world.
ReplyDeleteI really like this post and how we cannot dismiss things too quickly because we simply don't understand the situation. People jump to conclusions too fast because they do not want to take the time or exert the effort required to get to someone or something.
ReplyDeleteThis relates largely to the security vs surveillance (in the digital world) debate that we had in class yesterday. One of the biggest ways that you can ensure security and surveillance is to make all sources transparent. When all involved know exactly whats going on, you essentially turn everyone into a potential whistle blower. Mozilla is a good example of this. Their software has been very well maintained for a long time because they are 100% open source. Those who own, run, create, and use their products know exactly what's going on at all times. and anything out of whack gets flagged right away. Unfortunately, I'm not sure if what I just mentioned actually relates to what your argument is.
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