Ask HN: Start a charity-driven staffing firm?

TL;DR a recent health scare has me reevaluating what I want out of life. I reason my wife and I can run a boutique staffing agency placing primarily software developers in the NYC area drawing salaries of up to 75k each, pay our overhead and together aim to donate 100k-200k+ as a business yearly.

I’m a veteran of the NYC IT staffing market but recent years have me disillusioned with the business and just doing some consulting work and taking some down time. A recent health scare really makes me want to make some big life changes that include focusing on work that matters. I think we can reduce our family spending to the point where we could take a family pay cut but do work we find fulfilling that ultimately makes a difference in the world. In my mind the goal would be to somehow have a formula that gives 50% of every placement to charity and the rest to cover payroll and overhead until we reach our 150k total salaries at which time everything short of overhead would go to charity. If our message resonated with companies and candidates to a point where our daily focus could be service rather than sales the amount we could give away (as two normal working people) could be incredible.

Question to the HN crowd: Am I crazy, could this work?

Crazy in a good way. I don't think you need to talk about your earnings distribution with either party.

Please remember to keep your hiring process human too and inculcate a culture among seekers where job attributes thus relevant are paid attention to.

As someone who worked in the wall-street in a quant role it can be a mad rush to nowhere and easy to get lost. So if you succeed, you'd be helping a whole lot of people.

Remember though- businesses take time to setup. The more you deviate from the normal the longer it may take you to get established.

To me, business is business. When a business gives to charity, I usually see that as a gimmick dreamed up by their marketing department. I would rather make more or pay less, and then donate my own money to charity. No I guess I'm not a fan of your idea, but don't let me stop you from trying!

I like your question very much. IMHO, every entreprise is a social entreprise. No matter what it does, it affects society, does it not?

So, giving away a % of the revenues shouldn't be necessary, as long as the business does something meaningful for society.

Looks like you would help people make a living, while helping companies find talent. That seems more-than-enough meaningful.

And if you'd like to be even more meaningful, you may experiment with how you select your clients -- so they, too, do meaningful things.

I'd keep all the revenues, not out of greed, but simply so that you don't suffer, allowing you to keep helping society in the long run.

I think you should also consider paying the employees more than you strictly need to. I think lots of private companies squeeze their employees on wedges. And sure squeezing them for charity is better than for shareholders.

If it were me I'd do an employee owned nonprofit, than a 'profits go to charity'.