Interesting turn on the idea.
Do you understand the tax code in which most non-profits operate under?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/501(c) take a look. It's comical.
Loose definition of working in the non-profit field is that the organization should have a mission of "social benefit." Hospitals, churches and museums all have the same weight, [all 501 (c) (3)'s] which I think is pretty suspect. There are complicated rules to the possibility of using X% of your money for lobbying purposes, and such. Really, they are formed exactly like corporations, but profits are supposed to be turned back into the company, rather than personal or board profit. There has been an explosion of non-profits since the 1960's for many reasons. I have my own opinions, and you may have yours.
And notice these two 501's:
501(c)(8) — Fraternal Beneficiary Societies and Associations
501(c)(10) — Domestic Fraternal Societies and Associations
What you may not know is that every theater company, museum, private school, ect is a non-profit institution. Any one who asks for a donation and assures you a tax deduction is one. If you wiped this system out of existence, none of the many institutions that you depend on for culture and education would exist. Slight of hands, anyone?
What better way to negate the human's natural creative abilities (the arts are a huge percentage of non-profits) by placing them in a system where they receive only tainted money to create their work. They also tell us we do "not make profit" so we constantly play the part of poor institutions, when statistically they are finding that the arts labor force, for example, is HUGE but severely underpaid.
What has been very interesting working in the non-profit world is this set up where you are begging for funding, creating a system of groveling to do your "socially good" work. It is very demeaning, and has trained a full generation or two to feel that hand outs are the only way to survive. This new generation is fed up, and seriously trying to shed the model with hybred models (notice the language) of mixed for-profit and not-for-profit models. There is also a large push to get "non-profit" out of the lexicon because of it negative quality from the start.
Obviously, shedding the old system and starting new is one way of doing it, and the field that I am in in screaming for this change- literally.
Now, I have to get back to writing one more of those groveling grant applications. Need to have the cash to do our socially good work
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