I was planning to donate the couple bucks I had left over from the year to the charity called “San Diego Zoo Wildlife Alliance”, I was doing a background check on CharityNavigator and they gave the charity full ratings so it seemed good.
Then I stumbled upon the salary section. What the fuck? I earn <20k a year and was planning to contribute to someone’s million dollar salary? WHAT.
Damn I’m in the wrong nonprofit lol. Building, activity and pay & benefits for 7 employees come in under $400k total budget/expenses and we have distributed millions and millions of pounds of food in the last few years.
My wife works for a non-profit where the Executive Director (CEO if you will) cannot make more than 5x what the lowest paid person makes. Wish more non-profits would adopt something similar
Well we don’t know if the lowest paid employee makes $254,927 at this one
That’s the Janitor. He drives Bentleys off the pier into the Pacific Ocean every second saturday.
His name is Keith
This is more of a system issue than bad behavior of an individual charity.
Charities can underpay a little bit, because working for a charity has its own appeal. But if you want a talented, experienced person to run your org, you have to consider what they could make if they worked for someone else. San Diego is not a cheap city, and has its fair share of CEO positions.
If you really want to stretch your dollar though, local food banks are probably a better bet.
But if you want a talented, experienced person to run your org, you have to consider what they could make if they worked for someone else.
That’s such bullshit reasoning. They make more than 99.9% of people. I get that not everyone is great, but you are saying 99.9% of people are all talentless hacks that couldn’t do a decent enough job to the extent that the salary savings would be worth it?
Guess my civil engineering degree and 18 years of experience is a worthless pile of shit.
Hypothetically, if you were looking at two civil engineering jobs, and one paid 100k/yr, and another paid 200k/yr, which would you pick?
Would it matter much if any of the construction guys doing the actually construction of your projects made 50k/yr? Are they less talented than you for that?
It’s not so much about “talentless hacks” vs “a decent job” as trying to entice the best person you can afford.
Depends on the job. But I make less than both those numbers. And the construction journeymen make more than me, actually.
Yes, they make less because they are less talented. I completely disagree with your assertion that these executives are more talented. I have yet to meet a business major that wasn’t an absolute moron.
What evidence do you have they are more qualified, besides some paradoxical “they must be because they are in the position” reasoning.?
It’s not an absolute, it’s just an incentive. Talent is also an intangible, it cannot really be measured. Nor does high pay in some way guarantee you will get a talented or qualified person for your position, it just gives you better odds. It’s bait, basically, but you cannot guarantee your bait will work to attract what you want.
I’m not sure of any evidence, I’m not an economist. I’m discussing the theory of how capitalist systems are intended to function. How well they succeed at this is very messy and muddled at best.
Lastly, I actually disagree that our hypothetical construction person makes less because they are less talented. It’s that their skill is in lower demand. They could be extremely talented, but there are simply more of them available, so less needs to be offered to attract them.
Convenient the C-Suite sticks to a theory that massively benefits themselves. Sorry, it’s bullshit.
And there is ample evidence. Look no further than how every other employee is treated. Do you think they could get the best veterinarians by paying say, $300,000/year? Of course. But they don’t because they recognize the diminishing returns of thinking they have to have the best. But somehow the C-suite makes itself immune.
And that goes back to your example. As an engineer, I can tell you that construction trades are in HUGE demand. Same with civil engineers. Yet pay isn’t going up, at least not much.
Executive pay has gone up far faster than pay for regular workers. Sorry, I don’t buy the explanation that somehow they are the only group struggling to to find top candidates.
The CEO does not set his own compensation. He is hired by the owners of whatever company to operate it for them. They ultimately determine the compensation.
I agree there’s no struggle to find top candidates, that’s for sure. That’s partly because the compensation tends to be very good. The trades, which do not compensate as well as a chief executive, are struggling more. If plumbers frequently pulled CEO pay, we would not have a shortage.
Other CEOs that sit on governing boards set the compensation. It’s the same thing.
Sorry, I’ll never buy that it’s fair compensation, especially for a nonprofit charity.
I always hear this argument, and it seems like straight up CEO propaganda. I remember how failing businesses HAVE TO hire multi million dollar CEOs and fire employees becuase how else will they get good leadership!
Motherfucker, your previous CEO also had the same salary and sent you into bankruptcy.
There is a market reason for doing that. If not there competition would’ve hired the budget CEO.
Just wait until you learn how much the US president makes. We should really be outsourcing government officials.
The the amount of work and responsibilities the presidency is actually waaay underpaid. CEOs on the other hand get paid like they run the world, while in reality they are just sucking dick.
In fact CEOs run the world. Think of Amazon, Microsoft, Apple, Tesla… You name it.
Thre must be an equivelent to “ate the onion” for “ate the Arrow-Debreu (1954)”
No, a company definitely doesn’t have to pay their CEOs generously, and not all do. The median pay for a CEO is actually about 250k/yr.
https://www.bls.gov/oes/2023/may/oes111011.htm
Though if we just look at CEOs from S&P 500 companies, that jumps up to 16 million. There’s going to be a lot of factors involved, from the size of the company to the cost of living in the area. A CEO in San Francisco is probably going to make a lot more than one in Milwaukee.
It’s less propaganda and more just understanding how the capitalist system is intended to function. It applies to other jobs as well, a software engineer can make quite a wide range of pay, depending on who they work for. Then they can also get increased pay for advancing up the ranks of their organization, as promotions often involve raises.
givewell.org ranks charities by their ‘efficiency’ in multiple categories and offers funds for bundled donation according to their constantly updated ranking. Its really cool for finding reputable charities if you are worried about your money going where it is needed.
Yeah, it’s a tough call to make. It’s like those car donation things. Like 90% of your car’s value goes to the company managing the sale, but that’s still 10% to the charity that they wouldn’t have anyway. Unless you want to deal with selling your own car, and giving the charity the money, it still does some good.
I suspect a $1M salary isn’t too insane for a CEO if they bring tangible value to the company. Also, with a lack of shareholders to answer to like in a publicly traded company, their motivations probably align with the cause they’re supporting. It’s not like they’re going to sell off a shitload of assets to bump stock price and escape with a golden parachute.
I’m not living in america. In my country this really isn’t a thing. Most charities have a sort of “everyone gets the same salary” policy which is usually around the median salary in the country.
This charity was just running a cool project I wanted to donate too. I dont care what the american system is like, no one deserves 1 million a year while there are people starving.
Why not donate to a local charity that might not receive as much, rather than a US based one?
How does not giving that ‘cool project’ money do any good?
Well I’m going to give to another charity obviously.
Because I don’t want half my donation to go towards massive salaries.
That’s a reasonable concern. For context, from their 2023 financial report, they spend $391 million on everything they do; even if you add all those salaries you posted together, that’s still about 99 cents out of every dollar going where you want it to go.
I don’t disagree that it’s an obscene salary, but for the most part that’s how the big charities work in the US. You have to either go with small, local charities or shrug and accept that around 1% of your donation will go to someone getting overpaid. It sucks!
Cool. My second option was an australian charity that is running a similar project and their highest salary seems to be 80k USD. So I’ll go with that one.
Top exec salary feels like a weird thing to focus on. Would it be better to donate to a charity with 50 overpaid middle managers rather than one with an obscenely overpaid c-suite? What if they are all reasonably compensated but spend most of the donations on lavish parties for fundraising?
According to charitynavigator 89.9% of their expenses go to their programs, and the rest is used for fundraising, salaries and other admin costs. This feels more reflective of the organization as a whole
I cannot speak for this charity, but it is highly unlikely that individual donations like yours fund those salaries. Often those positions exist to lobby governments and secure large charitable donations. People like that are hire primarily for their contacts. You could hire a qualified “CEO” to run your org for ~$250k, but they likely won’t have Larry Ellison on speed dial or be the god parent of the kid of a senator, etc, etc.
You want to have friends in high places and friends with loads of money if you are fighting for wildlife preservation because otherwise nobody will even acknowledge your existence.
A 501c3 has restrictions on lobbying.
They also have limitations on income beyond donations.
This isn’t a Mozilla situation where there are separate corp and org entities. His salary is most definitely funded by donations in some way.
Note: I do agree with your rationale overall. Money is where money is, unfortunately.
Great, sounds like they didn’t need that donation money since the C-suite will get them all the rich kickbacks they need. So what’s the problem?
Best not give them your money then based on your principles.
Right?
People complain but then they rarely put there money where there mouth is.
But they are literally doing that by not donating after finding out…
Talent and experience isn’t that rare. Nor does executive compensation correlate with performance.
Whether it does or not is irrelevant; what matters is the perception among executives that it does.
I think we’ve been shown there is a solution to that perception.
I know a few things which ought to matter a whole lot more to executives.
But Elon said CEOs are the most important people because they create the value.
The pay correlates directly to how hard you are to replace.
Again, no. In most businesses the hard to replace workers are not promoted because they can’t be replaced. The ones that can be replaced are the ones who are promoted to management.
Unpopular opinion: Charities should be morally allowed to compete for top talent on a financial basis.
Unpopular opinion: “top talent” is a meaningless capitalistic word to justify crazy wealth disparities
It doesn’t seem like an unpopular opinion at all
Try interacting with offshore contractors who were hired to cut costs.
The board are fiduciaries. They have to do the math to prove hiring a more expensive CEO is ultimately better than not.
So why don’t you go work for a charity for 25k american a year? I’m sure you can do a much better job than overpaid C staff and pass all the rest of the money on to the actual cause, right? After all, you went to one of the best unis in the WHOLE world.
Plenty of non-american charities dont over pay people. You would expect people who work in charity to not be greedy. Greed is when you take more than you should because you think you deserve it.
If an exec can work two places and one pays an exorbitant amount but the other is a good cause, it would be altruistic to go to the good cause. If in the same situation the two places pay the same, I’m not sure it’s greed if you don’t give some back. The problem is that c suite folks in general are chronically overpaid. So the argument is that people who are very competent but don’t care about a cause should… take less money on principle I guess?
I mean sure I agree it seems ridiculous for charities to pay 8 figure salaries, but from a micro economics standpoint it doesn’t really make sense to walk away from an 8 figure salary to work for a charity either. Maybe it makes sense if you are already retired or it is your life passion, but that pool of people may be pretty small and maybe not hugely competitive.
Competent people who don’t care about the cause shouldnt take the job at all. People earning 8 figures shouldnt expect to make the same at a charity. Greed and altruism are values or qualities a person can possess and I dont think they can exist in the same person.
The United Health CEO thought he was altruistic, his family does as well. Its pretty clear the vast majority of people see greed there, not altruism.
Greedy people simply shouldnt be in charge of helping people.
I don’t think anyone is deluded enough to think for-profit insurance does anything altruistic. There is comparison at all between UHC and a charity.
In a purely ideological way I see and understand what you’re saying. In practice what I read from your message is “Charities should pay less and take who they can get”. Maybe there’s a competent altruist, and then maybe charities and nonprofits that don’t get competent staff at a “charity appropriate salary point” can just… dissolve or something? And they should do that whether they have the money to pay more or not, because charities paying more money is just flat distasteful.
Partly agree there. Top talent in this context doesnt have to mean you are an expert at something. It usually just means you are worth a lot of money because having you generates even more money.
Imagine making 50k and generating 100Mio a year in protif for your company (doesnt matter how, maybe you just know the right people, Biden is your cousin or something). Wouldnt you feel exploited? Some other company might offer you 500k, bevause they know its still more than worth it.
Cool, so americans will do anything for money. Even in charities. Is that what you want to hang your hat on? Its awful behavior and the OP is right to highlight the hypocrisy of a charity CEO making over 10 times the cost of living.
A person leading a charity shouldnt have such an ego that they think they deserve so much more than anyone else. How could they possibly understand the concept of charity?
My point wasnt that it is morally right, which it isnt. But OP made it sound like some evil masterminds are pulling the strings so rich people can stay in power, when it is simply people doing whats best for themselves. People are being judgemental but I think most wouldnt sacrifice 90% of their paycheck ‘because its the right thing to do’. Most people already earn 10 or 100 times more than people in Africa for example and are still buying from Amazon or temu contributing to exploitation. When people have the chance to make/save lots of money, they usually take it.
Its not simply people doing what’s best for the selves, its greedy parents who have raised greedy children who grow up thinking their job title and bank account number represent who they are. They could choose any other values to pursue in life but actively choose greed each day.
The catalyst to change oneself comes from within, so I hold people responsible who refuse to learn or change.
Realistic opinion: It takes zero “talent” to sit on a board and collect money.
(Ofc this zio wacko supports extreme inequality. Probably thinks poors are all palestinian.)
Here’s the thing: I don’t know about this charity in particular. But in general, a big charity is just as complicated a business as a big for profit company.
The task of managing it isn’t any easier. So the people who have experience in managing big businesses can get that kind of money elsewhere, too.
In our system, the charity is pretty much forced to pay competitive CEO salaries if they want experienced people at the helm.
If they paid much less, they wouldn’t get anyone to do the job who’s actually competent.for me its more like whats the lowest paid worker. Nowadays you are going to have trouble under six figures in any major city and the ceo is not much over 10x that. Now I doubt the lowest paid worker makes that but it would be great if they did.
The market rates are not about trying to make everyone make a living. It is all about how hard you are to replace.
If you do the job only 0.1% of people can do you will make bank. If you do the job anyone with a pulse can do you will make almost nothing.
https://sandiegozoowildlifealliance.org/sites/default/files/2024-07/2023-SDZWA-Annual-Report.pdf
Total revenue per year is 420 million.
Concessions and cleaning staff typically make 35k-40k. Zookeepers ~50k.
These 5 employees. Amount to .8% of the yearly operating budget, while the sum of all other employees totals up to 10% of the 400 million dollar operating budget.
I’m not making any judgements, just offering the numbers.
They pay cooks less than $20/hour in a city with an average rent of $3000/month. I’ve got no problem passing judgement.
They pay cooks less than $20/hour
So their cooks get paid less than ‘cooks’ at McDonald’s? Fast food minimum wage is $20/hour throughout California.
Correct.
Why did you put “cooks” in quotes? Do you think fry cooks aren’t cooks? Churning out food in a hot kitchen is work, regardless of what you think of the end product
While most work is hard, and I dunno how bespoke this gig is, there’s a massive difference between a generic fry “cook” and a restaurant line cook/chef.
Most fry cooks, like a Macdonald’s, are a finely tuned production line where most of the food is pre-prepped and premade (most of the “cooking” is done in a factory). The “cooks” in those roles usually just assemble the pre made components, and in the case of fast food, have finely tunes tools to serve their generic menu.
A restaurant cook/chef requires significantly more attention to detail, skill, flexibility, and knowledge because most of the food is made from scratch, using raw ingredients, which is why there are culinary schools. Real restaurants can’t succeed with a kitchen full of deep fryers and teenagers pushing buttons. Naturally, the expectation is that they should be paid more because it requires more skill, knowledge, effort, and dedication.
We’re already making the (existing) distinction between cook/chef though.
There’s no apparent need for a “cook”/cook/chef distinction.
As a chef with 22 years of experience hiring cooks, there is absolutely a distinction. I would have said fast food worker instead of “cook” because the quotes make it feel condescending, but I also do not count experience in fast food as relevant experience when reviewing resumes for a line or prep cook position.
We’re also misusing the word chef a lot in this conversation. Everyone working the line in a kitchen is not a chef. They are cooks. The chefs are the kitchen leadership. There is typically one executive chef and one or two sous chefs below them. I’m simplifying things a bit but that’s the most common structure you’ll find in non-chain/corpo kitchens.
I’m not saying that McDonald’s isn’t hard work - I definitely agree with you there. I was just referring to the fact that McDonald’s food is fairly straightforward to cook such that a teenager with minimal experience can do it, compared to a restaurant where they have many different menu items cooked from scratch and the chefs need more detailed knowledge of the items.
Vast majority of charities are just gritters getting paid off your feels lol
always has been, deny these parasites profits.
That’s the whole point of Charity Navigator though, so you can find the few that are worth giving to.
That’s why I’m very picky about donating. When I was at my very first job, pushing 1200 packages an hour at UPS for hourly wages, I donated to the United Way via payroll deduction. I was listening to the news in my car when I heard the CEO of United Way took his family on a $2M vacation. I had that payroll deduction removed on the very next shift.
Blood banks. “Your blood saves lives”. Is actually “We can sell your blood to hospitals for $200 per pint”. Check the salaries of the non-profit blood bank CEO and board. I would gladly share my blood if I’m paid $100 per pint, or if they gave insurance vouchers for a free pint of blood, to avoid insurance charging $1000-3000 to get a pint back. In fact they could just call it “blood insurance” where your premium is paid in regular blood donations.
Honestly this might sound weird but why can’t you just go around selling Organs? Wouldn’t that drive companies to make artificial Organs?
This also could backfire like crazy so maybe it isn’t the greatest idea.
Yes this would certainly lead to murder.
So straight people get blood for free since they can donate, but gay people, chronically ill people and drug addicts don’t, because they aren’t allowed to.
Not to mention those of us that just lived in the wrong country for a while in the 80’s.
I think they fixed the gay bit recently, 2023.
Well we don’t want cancer or drugs in blood. But the current screening criteria for blood donations are kinda crazy. Travel to certain countries, tattoos. They should just test for the stuff they’re worried about directly: HIV, Hepatitis, and Malaria. Not that it matters since it’s illegal to buy/sell bodily fluids.
Source on getting blood for free from donating? It’s not that I don’t believe you, I’ve just never heard of it.
Read the comment I replied to.
I misunderstood. I thought you were saying it’s a real thing rather than discussing the idea. Thanks!
Wow, no wonder they don’t make a profit 🙃
No affiliation, and I’ve never donated to them, but their financials are far from the worst:
There are many charities that don’t spend the majority of donations on the actual program. Like, wtf…
There are some non profits that are money funneling machines. Enter College board and CompTia.
I’d like to call out the Susan G. Komen breast cancer foundation here. You know the pink ribbon people. They are ridiculously corrupt. They only give 21% of what they take in.
Was put to me at a young age that non-profit only means they spend any revenue they get before it gets to the bottom line to show up as a gain or loss. Always good to sort out the shady from the legit.
that’s not just non profits. ever wonder how so many nominally “unprofitable” companies seem to stick around forever?
This is a good reminder that you can look up Form 990 for any nonprofit (they are required to submit one), which includes any staff that make over $100k.
Also, it looks like the “salaries” you found are total compensation, which also includes medical and retirement benefits. The CEO’s salary is around $600k, but also got a $300k+ bonus.
Okay, so think about it like this:
Suppose your job is making wooden chairs. It’s takes you the exact same skills to make a wooden chair to sell for profit, as it does to make a wooden chair to donate to a chairless children’s charity, right? So why would you spend all your time and skills doing a job that’s eventually going to bankrupt you? While you might do a few chairs because you feel like it’s morally right, the bulk of your work is going to be selling chairs because that’s how you sustain yourself.
CEOs are in the same situation. A 500-person for-profit company takes the exact same skill set to run as a 500-person non-profit. So the reality is that non-profits need to either be competitive in pay with for-profits, or they have to be attractive in ways other than compensation so they can entice CEOs to work for them.
Now, none of that is to say that the scale of CEO compensation is appropriate, because it’s not. But that’s the calculus a non-profit has to make.
If the only reason a ceo wants to work for a charity is the huge paycheck, they have the wrong set of values to run a charity.
Being a CEO of a charity is not about prestige. This is why a lot of american charities come across as grifts in my opinion.
You should ask why a person would accept that much money to do that kind of job, they could ask for an appropriate amount but instead take what they can get.
