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Much philanthropy is a routinized exchange between salaried bureaucrats

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Re: Much philanthropy is a routinized exchange between salaried bureaucrats

#211

Post by goodpoint »

gruez wrote: post #165
ZeroGravitas wrote: post #131

Another only mildly disguised attack on democracy. > If you’re used to thinking that our democratic system is in bad shape, that can sound jarring. But she’s working in the tradition of what philosophers call “ideal theory”; the aim is to sketch out what a good system would be, assuming that everyone fully complied with its rules. I'm used to thinking that democracy is in poor shape because rich and powerful people p…

>this author seems to take as a fairly key element of their argument that people getting stupid rich and then doing government type stuff without democratic oversight is good [...] Which part is bad? The "government type stuff" or the "without democratic oversight"? I agree that billionaires fielding their own armies/police forces would be pretty bad, but what's wrong with funding homeless shelters or schools? If I d…

> what's wrong with funding homeless shelters or schools?

...that such organization replace the government in doing such services and they obviously run without democratic oversight

> If I decide to volunteer at a soup kitchen, am I also "doing government type stuff without democratic oversight"?

Do you have the power to control how millions are spent? To direct thousands of employees?

No - then it's the opposite of undemocratic. It's actually very good for society.

Re: Much philanthropy is a routinized exchange between salaried bureaucrats

#212

Post by WaitWaitWha »

dontbenebby wrote: post #182

Yup. Money isn't the issue with nonprofits (well aside from paying your execs multiples of the max on the GS scale while whining if the low level staffers ask to be paid in line with the GS payscale) The issue is they pay their executives $$$$$ while insisting low level employees take much less than they'd make as government employees while feeling entitled to shape someone's career for the rest of their LIFE if they…

the two pay scales you posted are not a complete picture. The CEO in the non-profit makes $397,684, while the top GS15 step 10 makes $176,300.

First, the more appropriate comparison would be the Senior Executive Service (SES) pay scale which tops out at $226,300.

Additionally, a non-profit executive takes retirement out of their earnings of $400K, while the government employee's retirement is guaranteed and does not come out of their $226K.

Re: Much philanthropy is a routinized exchange between salaried bureaucrats

#213

Post by suture »

QuarterReptile wrote: post #210
suture wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Remove UK government support for food for the poor. This includes school lunches and whatnot. Will the charities be able to fill the need? The answer is no. Charities can fill gaps but not beyond that.

This is true in the same way that US rail wouldn't be able to fill commuter demand if every ICE car disappeared. It should surprise no one that an organization accustomed to, and thus built for, one thing would fail to instantaneoulsy shift to doing a somewhat similar thing on a completely different scale.

I disagree. My claim is not that charity wouldn’t be able to fill the demand right now in the scenario I presented. My claim is that it would never be able to fill the demand. Indeed, charity has never fulfilled the basic needs of the poor in any country ever.

Re: Much philanthropy is a routinized exchange between salaried bureaucrats

#214

Post by corrral »

inglor_cz wrote: post #58
Spooky23 wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really. Flyover and southern states in particular mooch off of the productive locales. So not only do I need to pay more taxes for the US government to fund almost double my states pro rata aid to places like West Virginia and Mississippi, but I get to pay even higher taxes because my locality actually provides things like sound education. You know what, I think we should exercise the people’s desire for small go…

My European experience says that even relatively small countries the size of Mississippi themselves have a fair share of folks kvetching that the richer parts subsidize the poorer parts. Few places are small or homogeneous enough not to experience that. A continent-wide country like the US can hardly escape the same. It is even worse if there is an ethnic difference in the mix (e.g. the Flemish vs. the Walloons in Be…

A crucial (though obviously not the only!) purpose of the US military is to provide a jobs program with nearly European/white-collar-US level social benefits (healthcare, college, retirement, even housing) to people with few options. It stands to reason this means volunteers disproportionately come from states with weak economies.

Re: Much philanthropy is a routinized exchange between salaried bureaucrats

#215

Post by munificent »

krzysiek wrote: post #113
croon wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What would be more interesting would be comparing it after including welfare/public education/healthcare/poverty rates etc. Best case scenario would be where no charity is needed, am I wrong?

Honestly I believe that the other way around would be way better. There is a lot of inefficiencies in the way governments work, plus they operate like monopolies. On the other hand there is competition between nonprofits, plus they are often multinational. I find it interesting that some of the most efficient government organizations (like World Food Programme) actually operate as charities (in the sense that everyon…

> There is a lot of inefficiencies in the way governments work,

There are plenty of inefficiencies in businesses too. I don't understand how anyone who has ever worked for a small or medium-sized company can complain about government waste. Almost every job I've had has been just riddled with ludicrous inefficiencies.

> plus they operate like monopolies.

Every philanthropist has a monopoly on the use of their funds.

At least with tax-supported government programs, voters have representation on how those funds are used.

Re: Much philanthropy is a routinized exchange between salaried bureaucrats

#216

Post by ars »

mercutio2 wrote: post #181
ars wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The tax break is only around 20% of the donation. Even if the donated money is not spent as perfectly as you would like, there's 5 times as much of it.

Huh? My marginal tax rate is ~45%. I get way more than a 20% benefit from 501c3 donations. I get to avoid capital gains on the donation of appreciated assets on top of that. For whom is the benefit only 20%?

Long term capital gains tax is 15%. The vast majority of these are against capital gains, not income.

Re: Much philanthropy is a routinized exchange between salaried bureaucrats

#217

Post by corrral »

s1artibartfast wrote: post #193
asdff wrote: post #52

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you want to voluntarily engage in a 'public' philanthropy ran by the government, you can just buy a government bond.

Alternatively, the fed and every state accepts donations. The number of people that actively donate to the government is quite small while the number that advocate for higher tax rate on others is quite High. Meanwhile, the state of California just celebrated a record tax year collecting a hundred billion dollars (30%) over the budget, and is struggling to find programs to squander it on.

> The number of people that actively donate to the government is quite small while the number that advocate for higher tax rate on others is quite High.

So? It's reasonable to advocate higher taxes for all while not harming oneself for much more limited public benefit in the meantime. This often gets trotted out as a "gotcha", but it's not.

Re: Much philanthropy is a routinized exchange between salaried bureaucrats

#218

Post by ChrisLomont »

munificent wrote: post #215
krzysiek wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Honestly I believe that the other way around would be way better. There is a lot of inefficiencies in the way governments work, plus they operate like monopolies. On the other hand there is competition between nonprofits, plus they are often multinational. I find it interesting that some of the most efficient government organizations (like World Food Programme) actually operate as charities (in the sense that everyon…

> There is a lot of inefficiencies in the way governments work, There are plenty of inefficiencies in businesses too. I don't understand how anyone who has ever worked for a small or medium-sized company can complain about government waste. Almost every job I've had has been just riddled with ludicrous inefficiencies. > plus they operate like monopolies. Every philanthropist has a monopoly on the use of their funds.…

>Every philanthropist has a monopoly on the use of their funds.

And there are lots of them, not operating all under one central control, so they are likely to help local needs, compete in other spaces, and spread the effects.

> At least with tax-supported government programs, voters have representation on how those funds are used.

And then those funds are mostly sent to a big few items taxpayers hear about and not so much to any other needs.

Voters also have representation on how charity funds are spent, since voters are the people making donations. If anything, this means your funds target what you want instead of what others want you to spend on.

Re: Much philanthropy is a routinized exchange between salaried bureaucrats

#219

Post by s1artibartfast »

corrral wrote: post #217
s1artibartfast wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Alternatively, the fed and every state accepts donations. The number of people that actively donate to the government is quite small while the number that advocate for higher tax rate on others is quite High. Meanwhile, the state of California just celebrated a record tax year collecting a hundred billion dollars (30%) over the budget, and is struggling to find programs to squander it on.

> The number of people that actively donate to the government is quite small while the number that advocate for higher tax rate on others is quite High. So? It's reasonable to advocate higher taxes for all while not harming oneself for much more limited public benefit in the meantime. This often gets trotted out as a "gotcha", but it's not.

First, I don't understand the logic of more taxes are good, but refusing to donate until others do it too. It seems that the harm is the same either way, and the benefit/$ is the same either way too.

(e.g. I can save a life with a dollar donation today, but wont do it until you agree to do it too so we can save 2 lives with 2 dollars)

In my mind, either you don't actually want to pay, or you don't actually think your donation will bring about public benefit you claim.

Second, I almost never see advocacy for higher taxes for all (including themselves). IMHO it is nearly always a call for higher taxes for some sub-group (usually others), and usually applied in a progressive manner.

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