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I used to work for a not for profit. The level of legal graft was enormous. We once got audited by a government agency. Said government agency had been extensi

I used to work for a not for profit. The level of legal graft was enormous. We once got audited by a government agency. Said government agency had been extensively burdened with restrictions in its operation by lobbying from the NFP space. After completing the audit, the gentleman running the government agency had a press release more less saying "I think it would be best if we were allowed to release our findings where they pertained to the expectations citizens have for the not for profit space, and not just where we find outright illegal behaviour. People should be able to understand exactly how much of a charities funding is used for its actual charitable purpose, and how much of its funds are effectively gifts for directors and staff" Which sort of sums it up. Graft goes on it just finds a legal path.

nickdothutton 1y ago
I have never seen a large NGO or charity where there was not a large degree of either grift, goofing-off, or a strong whiff of outright fraud of one sort or another. This has really coloured my view of all such orgs.
- bionsystem 1y ago
  Charity and non-profit look to me like the easiest way to finance corruption with tax evasion, while making yourself (esp. if you're a billionaire) look good.
  - protocolture 1y ago
    I dunno, probably differs based on jurisdiction but the one thing that cant happen in my jurisdiction is people on the board directly profiting from the charity. They get well kept mind. But they never "own" the proceeds. IIRC one of the directors of mine was found with 3 corporate vehicles assigned to him. Now on the flipside, being upper management in the same charity was a goldmine. Upper 6 figure salary, no expectations, vendors taking you on substantial holidays and meals to get your business, low 6 figure bonus every 12 months. Different worlds tbh.
- protocolture 1y ago
  Yeah thats been my experience as well. Its also my experience that the reverse is true, small charities tend to be staffed by true believers who are working as hard as possible towards their goal.
  - Propelloni 1y ago
    > Its also my experience that the reverse is true, small charities tend to be staffed by true believers who are working as hard as possible towards their goal. Same.
  - nickdothutton 1y ago
    The volunteers are almost always the good souls in these places. It is the "professionals" that are the problem in my experience. All the way to the top.
    - protocolture 1y ago
      Depends on scale. I did some consulting for a separate branch of the same organisation. They only had ~4 full time staff, people who had been promoted out of the volunteer pool. There was a small amount of nepotism, but everyone getting paid was absolutely crazy about the purpose of the organisation. And IIRC the salaries were very low. Compare that to the branch I existed in, and it was chalk and cheese. Layers and layers of do nothing management drawing spectacular wages and finding ways to send themselves to fabulous parties and media events. There was a component of the business focused on rehabilitation, and it operated for 3-4 years with only 6 or so staff. They would go on fantastic rehab holidays to demonstrate the benefit of their programs. Unfortunately for those first years they struggled to find volunteers for their rehab programs, so they were constantly sending their own staff on tours of europe or sailing adventures etc.
- dghlsakjg 1y ago
  To be fair, this describes a large percentage of ALL large human organizations, including for profit, educational, and government entities.
- Pet_Ant 1y ago
  Sorry but no, even medium-sized, enterprise doesn't have the exact problems that people complain about government. I can share stories with government employees and we have the same dynamics. Large dis-organizations with many stakeholders have the same dynamics. Governments at least are inclined to help people whereas enterprises aren't.
  - protocolture 1y ago
    My mate in government and I share stories all the time. But my "And in this crazy company we had multiple competing teams with different management responsible for IT infrastructure" stories pale in comparison with his "Well we have 12 teams in 3 separate lines of business technically spanning 2 ministries" stories.
skrebbel 1y ago
What's "the NFP space"? I googled but all I find is random local clubs and companies called NFP, none of which look like powerful lobby clubs.
- compiler-devel 1y ago
  NFP = Not For Profit
- protocolture 1y ago
  Not for profit. Covers full charities, and other legal statuses like public beneficials etc.
- piltdownman 1y ago
  Try the likes of the Hans Wilsdorf Foundation, the beneficial owners of Rolex who operate under the guise of a charity. There is no requirement to disclose financial or charitable donations under law, and the company pays no corporate taxes as a result of being owned by the Foundation.
  - alephnerd 1y ago
    Tbf, that's a common bordering on default corporate setup in DACH in order keep ownership within the family [0], and in my opinion, symptomatic of why a number of German industries have been falling behind. Some amount of creative disruption is needed to incentivize innovation, but there are roadblocks against that created by the families who ancestors took advantage of creative disruption 50-70 years ago. Bosch, Thyssenkrupp, Aldi, Lidl, Bertelsmann, etc all do that. [0] - https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=f1b666a8-1257-4d81-b28c-26f81ecba298 https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=f1b666a8-1257...
- genewitch 1y ago
  People usually call i t NGO for non-government organisation. Not For Profit is just another euphemism. In casual conversation people usually say nonprofit. Or if they feel fancy, a 501.c3 nonprofit. In the US. Not sure how these work in other countries.
snapplebobapple 1y ago
To me, it just looks like the natural consequence of the NFP space being the last stop on the chain of tax avoidance tools used by the moderately to very rich to avoid insane tax levels. (refresher: Trust(s)-> custom large whole life policies -> whole life policies fund new trusts and new life insurance for the next generation -> remnants of old trusts that can't be evacuated tax efficiently are donated to family controlled charity that funds family controlled not for profits).In a setup like that, the NFP becomes just another bucket of tax privileged cash to use to further your interests by way of cushy appointments to staff/board positions or, rarely, charitable work that furthers some economic goal of the family. In that setup what you see as graft is the real value and what you see as charity is the cost paid in lieu of taxes on the pot of money. The actual graft is unfortunately the behaviour enabled at charities that actually take average person cash through fundraising.
- no_wizard 1y ago
  What exactly are insane tax levels we are talking about here? I don’t understand the characterization
  - Pet_Ant 1y ago
    I think "insane tax levels" means having to contribute back to the society that made their success possible in the first place.
    - no_wizard 1y ago
      Thats my suspicion. I'll never understand how this ends up disconnected in peoples minds that the society you live in is the one that let you thrive, and you have to contribute back to it to keep the ecosystem healthy, no different than anything else
      - snapplebobapple 1y ago
        It's more that you are utterly disconnected because you associate spending more with contributing back, when spending more on failure incentivizes failure. You seem to think I don't want to contribute back when my complaint is I'm contributing a ton and seeing poor results for that contribution. My desire is for the ecosystem to be healthy and for my country and the world to thrive and throwing money in non stop and seeing it wasted is not healthy or sustainable. Here's a refresher: What you spend is your measure of failure. What you get is your measure of success. What I get is not a whole lot (and yes I value and want to see social goods like great healthcare, education, transportation, etc, because those things are good for me and good for my business) and what I spend is at atrocity levels, which makes this a situation that incentivizes me to lobby and otherwise legally manage those expenses.
throw10920 1y ago
> Said government agency had been extensively burdened with restrictions in its operation by lobbying from the NFP space. This is incorrect and dishonest. The restrictions come from government employees and elected officials. The lobbyists cannot force them to do anything. These are facts, not opinions. If your decision makers are corrupt and not acting in your best interests, then you need to hold them accountable for that. I've never heard a single person on HN (or real life in my country) say "I was tracking the bills that my senators voted on, noticed they voted for something bad, and sent them a letter", or voted against them next election cycle, or anything similar, because almost nobody does it. This is a failure of democracy, on the part of the citizens, because democracy isn't just voting - it's monitoring the behavior of those you voted for and holding them accountable. (I'm not saying anything about people you didn't vote for, for obvious reasons) If you are not keeping track of what your representatives are doing, and voting for them anyway, you are actively making the situation worse. Sure, lobbying needs to be much more regulated or outright banned in many countries (including my own) - but even an individual of below-average intelligence can see why even if lobbying is banned, all of the above still applies - if you're not keeping track of your representatives actions, even if they're not being lobbied, they can and will continue to act in their own interests and sacrifice yours, and you're failing your country. Lobbying is not the root problem - corruption and lack of accountability are.
- vkou 1y ago
  So in other words, the bribe-giver can't force the bribe-taker to accept their money, so they are off the hook.
  - throw10920 1y ago
    I think you might have responded to the wrong comment by accident, because yours is clearly irrelevant to mine.
- protocolture 1y ago
  >This is incorrect and dishonest. The restrictions come from government employees and elected officials. The lobbyists cannot force them to do anything. These are facts, not opinions. I disagree in part. You are correct that politicians should share some of the blame, but as we know the breed of insect known as politician lacks any kind of spine, they tend to bow down to any lobby that is large enough to cause them any electoral fright. In this instance, we had a government scrap this regulatory body entirely, and the next government restored it but "upon consultation" left the teeth out. Everyone sucks here as they say on reddit. >If you are not keeping track of what your representatives are doing, and voting for them anyway, you are actively making the situation worse. Classic beige dictatorship. Theres no way to keep a government accountable for the small actions that are near or completely bipartisan. They just make the election about some big other thing and keep getting away with it. People are forced to judge parties as a whole, and it sucks. >Lobbying is not the root problem - corruption and lack of accountability are. Honestly its the entire system as designed. Theres no way to sting a government over a single issue. Especially if 90% of the voters dont care about the issue.

nickdothutton 1y ago

I have never seen a large NGO or charity where there was not a large degree of either grift, goofing-off, or a strong whiff of outright fraud of one sort or another. This has really coloured my view of all such orgs.

bionsystem 1y ago
Charity and non-profit look to me like the easiest way to finance corruption with tax evasion, while making yourself (esp. if you're a billionaire) look good.
- protocolture 1y ago
  I dunno, probably differs based on jurisdiction but the one thing that cant happen in my jurisdiction is people on the board directly profiting from the charity. They get well kept mind. But they never "own" the proceeds. IIRC one of the directors of mine was found with 3 corporate vehicles assigned to him. Now on the flipside, being upper management in the same charity was a goldmine. Upper 6 figure salary, no expectations, vendors taking you on substantial holidays and meals to get your business, low 6 figure bonus every 12 months. Different worlds tbh.
protocolture 1y ago
Yeah thats been my experience as well. Its also my experience that the reverse is true, small charities tend to be staffed by true believers who are working as hard as possible towards their goal.
- Propelloni 1y ago
  > Its also my experience that the reverse is true, small charities tend to be staffed by true believers who are working as hard as possible towards their goal. Same.
- nickdothutton 1y ago
  The volunteers are almost always the good souls in these places. It is the "professionals" that are the problem in my experience. All the way to the top.
  - protocolture 1y ago
    Depends on scale. I did some consulting for a separate branch of the same organisation. They only had ~4 full time staff, people who had been promoted out of the volunteer pool. There was a small amount of nepotism, but everyone getting paid was absolutely crazy about the purpose of the organisation. And IIRC the salaries were very low. Compare that to the branch I existed in, and it was chalk and cheese. Layers and layers of do nothing management drawing spectacular wages and finding ways to send themselves to fabulous parties and media events. There was a component of the business focused on rehabilitation, and it operated for 3-4 years with only 6 or so staff. They would go on fantastic rehab holidays to demonstrate the benefit of their programs. Unfortunately for those first years they struggled to find volunteers for their rehab programs, so they were constantly sending their own staff on tours of europe or sailing adventures etc.
dghlsakjg 1y ago
To be fair, this describes a large percentage of ALL large human organizations, including for profit, educational, and government entities.
Pet_Ant 1y ago
Sorry but no, even medium-sized, enterprise doesn't have the exact problems that people complain about government. I can share stories with government employees and we have the same dynamics. Large dis-organizations with many stakeholders have the same dynamics. Governments at least are inclined to help people whereas enterprises aren't.
- protocolture 1y ago
  My mate in government and I share stories all the time. But my "And in this crazy company we had multiple competing teams with different management responsible for IT infrastructure" stories pale in comparison with his "Well we have 12 teams in 3 separate lines of business technically spanning 2 ministries" stories.

skrebbel 1y ago

What's "the NFP space"? I googled but all I find is random local clubs and companies called NFP, none of which look like powerful lobby clubs.

compiler-devel 1y ago
NFP = Not For Profit
protocolture 1y ago
Not for profit. Covers full charities, and other legal statuses like public beneficials etc.
piltdownman 1y ago
Try the likes of the Hans Wilsdorf Foundation, the beneficial owners of Rolex who operate under the guise of a charity. There is no requirement to disclose financial or charitable donations under law, and the company pays no corporate taxes as a result of being owned by the Foundation.
- alephnerd 1y ago
  Tbf, that's a common bordering on default corporate setup in DACH in order keep ownership within the family [0], and in my opinion, symptomatic of why a number of German industries have been falling behind. Some amount of creative disruption is needed to incentivize innovation, but there are roadblocks against that created by the families who ancestors took advantage of creative disruption 50-70 years ago. Bosch, Thyssenkrupp, Aldi, Lidl, Bertelsmann, etc all do that. [0] - https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=f1b666a8-1257-4d81-b28c-26f81ecba298 https://www.lexology.com/library/detail.aspx?g=f1b666a8-1257...
genewitch 1y ago
People usually call i t NGO for non-government organisation. Not For Profit is just another euphemism. In casual conversation people usually say nonprofit. Or if they feel fancy, a 501.c3 nonprofit. In the US. Not sure how these work in other countries.

snapplebobapple 1y ago

To me, it just looks like the natural consequence of the NFP space being the last stop on the chain of tax avoidance tools used by the moderately to very rich to avoid insane tax levels. (refresher: Trust(s)-> custom large whole life policies -> whole life policies fund new trusts and new life insurance for the next generation -> remnants of old trusts that can't be evacuated tax efficiently are donated to family controlled charity that funds family controlled not for profits).In a setup like that, the NFP becomes just another bucket of tax privileged cash to use to further your interests by way of cushy appointments to staff/board positions or, rarely, charitable work that furthers some economic goal of the family. In that setup what you see as graft is the real value and what you see as charity is the cost paid in lieu of taxes on the pot of money. The actual graft is unfortunately the behaviour enabled at charities that actually take average person cash through fundraising.

no_wizard 1y ago
What exactly are insane tax levels we are talking about here? I don’t understand the characterization
- Pet_Ant 1y ago
  I think "insane tax levels" means having to contribute back to the society that made their success possible in the first place.
  - no_wizard 1y ago
    Thats my suspicion. I'll never understand how this ends up disconnected in peoples minds that the society you live in is the one that let you thrive, and you have to contribute back to it to keep the ecosystem healthy, no different than anything else
    - snapplebobapple 1y ago
      It's more that you are utterly disconnected because you associate spending more with contributing back, when spending more on failure incentivizes failure. You seem to think I don't want to contribute back when my complaint is I'm contributing a ton and seeing poor results for that contribution. My desire is for the ecosystem to be healthy and for my country and the world to thrive and throwing money in non stop and seeing it wasted is not healthy or sustainable. Here's a refresher: What you spend is your measure of failure. What you get is your measure of success. What I get is not a whole lot (and yes I value and want to see social goods like great healthcare, education, transportation, etc, because those things are good for me and good for my business) and what I spend is at atrocity levels, which makes this a situation that incentivizes me to lobby and otherwise legally manage those expenses.

throw10920 1y ago

> Said government agency had been extensively burdened with restrictions in its operation by lobbying from the NFP space. This is incorrect and dishonest. The restrictions come from government employees and elected officials. The lobbyists cannot force them to do anything. These are facts, not opinions. If your decision makers are corrupt and not acting in your best interests, then you need to hold them accountable for that. I've never heard a single person on HN (or real life in my country) say "I was tracking the bills that my senators voted on, noticed they voted for something bad, and sent them a letter", or voted against them next election cycle, or anything similar, because almost nobody does it. This is a failure of democracy, on the part of the citizens, because democracy isn't just voting - it's monitoring the behavior of those you voted for and holding them accountable. (I'm not saying anything about people you didn't vote for, for obvious reasons) If you are not keeping track of what your representatives are doing, and voting for them anyway, you are actively making the situation worse. Sure, lobbying needs to be much more regulated or outright banned in many countries (including my own) - but even an individual of below-average intelligence can see why even if lobbying is banned, all of the above still applies - if you're not keeping track of your representatives actions, even if they're not being lobbied, they can and will continue to act in their own interests and sacrifice yours, and you're failing your country. Lobbying is not the root problem - corruption and lack of accountability are.

vkou 1y ago
So in other words, the bribe-giver can't force the bribe-taker to accept their money, so they are off the hook.
- throw10920 1y ago
  I think you might have responded to the wrong comment by accident, because yours is clearly irrelevant to mine.
protocolture 1y ago
>This is incorrect and dishonest. The restrictions come from government employees and elected officials. The lobbyists cannot force them to do anything. These are facts, not opinions. I disagree in part. You are correct that politicians should share some of the blame, but as we know the breed of insect known as politician lacks any kind of spine, they tend to bow down to any lobby that is large enough to cause them any electoral fright. In this instance, we had a government scrap this regulatory body entirely, and the next government restored it but "upon consultation" left the teeth out. Everyone sucks here as they say on reddit. >If you are not keeping track of what your representatives are doing, and voting for them anyway, you are actively making the situation worse. Classic beige dictatorship. Theres no way to keep a government accountable for the small actions that are near or completely bipartisan. They just make the election about some big other thing and keep getting away with it. People are forced to judge parties as a whole, and it sucks. >Lobbying is not the root problem - corruption and lack of accountability are. Honestly its the entire system as designed. Theres no way to sting a government over a single issue. Especially if 90% of the voters dont care about the issue.