Most frequently "The CEO gets paid $X! Doesn't sound like a non-profit to me!"

I hear this all the time. As if the people working there shouldn't be paid.

and part of the reason we hear this all the time is because non-profits are required to report exec compensation but private cos are not required to report the absolutely ridiculous amounts their owner-CEOs are making

Getting paid and being paid an exorbitant amount as a grift is completely different.

why do people in our industry always make the assumption that everyone else are morons?

The populace understands what a non-profit is.

The populace can point to some obvious examples of non profits like charities. They cannot point to the nuance.

> A person is smart. People are dumb, panicky dangerous animals

our industry? I know the public doesnt because I grew up among people working in non profit sphere and the things people say on here and elsewhere about what non profits do and don't is just flat out wrong.

e: i mean it is obvious, most people even on here do not seem to know what profit even is, for instance https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=39563492

this argument is unfair.

Unless you're a lawyer specializing in negligence, there is nuance to negligence you don't know about. Does that imply you don't understand negligence?

You need to separate those two things out from each other.

I think the public is well aware that “non profit” is yet another scam that wealthy elites take advantage of, not available in the same way to the common citizen.

Or at least not available to the common citizen who does not have the $50 incorporation fee

What matters isn't the money, but the knowledge of what to do with it. And that is not easily obtained by the common citizen at all.

It's not even knowledge. I can't take advantage of most of the tax breaks rich people can because I am not in control of billions of dollars of physical and intellectual property to play shell games with.

As a normal citizen with a normal career, I do not have any levers to play with to """optimize""" what the IRS wants me to pay. For some reason, we let people in control of billions of dollars worth of physical stuff and IP give them different names, and put them under different paper roofs so that they can give the IRS less money. It's such utter nonsense.

Why should you have MORE ability to defer your tax liability by having MORE stuff? People make so many excuses about "but Jeff Bezos doesn't actually have billions in cash, he holds that much value in Amazon stock" as if that doesn't literally translate to controlling billions of dollars of Amazon property and IP and influence.

Why does controlling more, and having more, directly translate to paying less?

> It's not even knowledge. I can't take advantage of most of the tax breaks rich people can because I am not in control of billions of dollars of physical and intellectual property to play shell games with.

In my view, not analogous to the OAi situation

Mark-to-market taxation is entirely unrelated to non-profits. You're just vaguely gesturing at wealthy people and taxes.

fwiw I am largely supportive of some form of mark-to-market.

Plus the lawyers and accountants to make sure it's setup properly and upkeep expenses