[DDN] I make no profit, therefore I suck

[Taran Rampersad]

Joe Beckmann wrote:
> Poverty is quite real, but it is not poverty that drives compassion or
> philanthropy as much as the philanthropist. Too many pretend it is the state
> of poverty - which is lots more universal than philanthropy. So also,
> services are never really free - somebody does something for a reason,
> whether it be financial or other, and that reason is the engine behind
> everything, regardless of whether it is profit or non-profit. Raising funds
> subsidizes the service, but does not render it free, even if "fully funded."
> It means merely that somebody else is paying in cash, others are paying in
> other forms.
>   
Right. That is what I hoped you meant because I agree with it. Some
people pay in cash, others in dignity.
> Finally, pricing has to do with the market, not with the profit. Profit
> drives SOME kinds of pricing; cash profit drives a subset of THOSE kinds of
> pricing; yet profit is a byproduct of the transaction, not the transaction
> itself. It is a real pretense that nonprofit ignores pricing, since - as
> that range of nonprofits implies - tuition can range from "in-kind" to
> $60,000/year; medical services from barter to almost infinitely expensive
> per incident. That variation is not dependent at all on whether the vendor
> is profit or non-profit, but, rather, on how the price reflects the mission
> of the organization and where the resources are or were or might come to
> cover none, some, or all of the expenses incurred.
>   
Right. I agree with this as well. It is something I don't often mention
in the 'cost vs. value' discussions.
> There is a lot of sloppy thinking regarding profit vs. nonprofit. In fact,
> in the West, the difference is only a matter of taxes and, to a lesser
> extent, the way the organization is regulated by public agencies, and,
> finally, in whether an investor gets a cash return, a capital return, or a
> philanthropic good feeling from a "successful" transaction. Many nonprofits
> pay quite handsomely; many for-profits go broke.
And some non-profits are abused, creating studies and so forth in the
hope to further funding... which also leads us back to your second
paragraph at a different level: Non-profits require funding at market
prices and spend WAY too much time doing so.

And as far as philanthropy... if it actually worked, wouldn't it have
put itself out of business by now? :-)

-- 
Taran Rampersad
Presently in: San Fernando, Trinidad and Tobago
cnd at knowprose.com
http://www.knowprose.com


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"Criticize by creating." — Michelangelo
"The present is theirs; the future, for which I really worked, is mine." - Nikola Tesla