4 ms·

On the flip side, what people seem to want “not for profit” to mean is “employees work for below market rate for some reason”. I don't get it. I would expect e

On the flip side, what people seem to want “not for profit” to mean is “employees work for below market rate for some reason”. I don't get it. I would expect employees at a non-profit to be compensated along the same lines as those at a for-profit. It's a constant easy story for shitty journalism in the UK – "oh my god this head of a charity makes far less than the head of an equivalently–sized private company! what a bastard!"

nisa 7y ago
I guess it's more like how many devs could be paid a decent salary from the millions that he Mozilla "leadership" pays itself.
- matthewmacleod 7y ago
  You’re saying the same thing but wrapping it up in scare quotes. You’re suggesting it would be better if Mozilla did… what? Had no leadership team, perhaps using some kind of non traditional management structure? Paid their leadership team below-market rate? Or is it just the general idea that high-level leaders are paid too much throughout society, and that this needs to be fixed? (Which is totally true, but not at all specific to Mozilla).
rjf72 7y ago
Take the ideological (and incorrect) definition of not-for-profit vs for-profit companies. The for-profit company is supposed to be willing to utilize any sort of money-making opportunity to improve their bottom line which is supposed to be their goal. The not-for-profit company is supposed to sidestep opportunities that do not necessarily align with their mission, resulting in less profit but greater integrity, as maintaining their mission is supposed to be their goal. If this were the case, not-for-profit business would invariably end up with substantially less funding than comparable for-profit businesses. As a consequence of this, it would be fiscally impossible for them provide the same sort of compensation. This is of course fallacious. But the reason for this is that not-for-profit and for-profit companies operate in mostly the same way. This is something that most people do not understand. This is precisely what I was aiming to point out to the person who initially said 'why would you ever contribute your time for free to a for-profit?' It's an intuitive, but incorrect understanding of the differences between the sort of a companies.

nisa 7y ago

I guess it's more like how many devs could be paid a decent salary from the millions that he Mozilla "leadership" pays itself.

matthewmacleod 7y ago
You’re saying the same thing but wrapping it up in scare quotes. You’re suggesting it would be better if Mozilla did… what? Had no leadership team, perhaps using some kind of non traditional management structure? Paid their leadership team below-market rate? Or is it just the general idea that high-level leaders are paid too much throughout society, and that this needs to be fixed? (Which is totally true, but not at all specific to Mozilla).

rjf72 7y ago

Take the ideological (and incorrect) definition of not-for-profit vs for-profit companies. The for-profit company is supposed to be willing to utilize any sort of money-making opportunity to improve their bottom line which is supposed to be their goal. The not-for-profit company is supposed to sidestep opportunities that do not necessarily align with their mission, resulting in less profit but greater integrity, as maintaining their mission is supposed to be their goal. If this were the case, not-for-profit business would invariably end up with substantially less funding than comparable for-profit businesses. As a consequence of this, it would be fiscally impossible for them provide the same sort of compensation. This is of course fallacious. But the reason for this is that not-for-profit and for-profit companies operate in mostly the same way. This is something that most people do not understand. This is precisely what I was aiming to point out to the person who initially said 'why would you ever contribute your time for free to a for-profit?' It's an intuitive, but incorrect understanding of the differences between the sort of a companies.