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The subsidies are quite low, actually. NPR itself only gets between 1-2% of its funding from the government. Member stations average about 11% from the Corpor

by AndrewO 17y ago

The subsidies are quite low, actually. NPR itself only gets between 1-2% of its funding from the government. Member stations average about 11% from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting, which is government funded. The rest comes from listeners during those annoying, but necessary pledge drives, private grants, and corporate sponsorship (and I can tell you from experience, they place a lot of constraints on what they'll say in that underwriting spot you pay for). Details here: http://www.npr.org/about/privatesupport.html http://www.npr.org/about/privatesupport.html

tjic 17y ago
This is blatantly false, for reasons I'll explain below. Also, you're conflating NPR (NPR, Inc.) with member stations. These are different entities. The topic is NPR. The numbers that you cite are not numbers for NPR. They are not even number for NPR member stations. They are aggregate numbers for public broadcasting stations ... including those not affiliated with NPR. Getting the truth out of NPR's reports can be tricky. They haven't filed an annual report in four years, and the financials are split up between NPR, Inc., the NPR foundation, the CPB, and various member stations. You have to read a LOT of documents to figure out some of this stuff. Let's start with NPR's financial documents. http://www.npr.org/about/statements/fy2008/fy08nprincreport.pdf I note $2.5 million in membership dues (individual donations) out of $172 mill total. Thus, individual subscribers and pledges make up 1.45% of NPR's budget. $68 million comes from station programming fees. What are these? These are fees that local affiliates pay to National Public Radio, Inc. Where do those dollars come from? A typical affiliate gets two thirds or more of its budget from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. The CPB is a shell corporation / funnel that connects federal dollars to NPR with a cut-out step. See the CPB financials here: http://www.cpb.org/aboutcpb/financials/budget/ The CPB gets $400 million per year from taxes, takes 10% off the top for operations, and funnels 90% of the money to local affiliates, which then funnel most of the money back to NPR. The data that you cite about the sources of funding are not for typical NPR affiliate stations: first, it includes many stations that aren't NPR stations, then it excludes many stations that are NPR stations (they mention this in a footnote). Where else does NPR get its revenue? Grants, contributions, and sponsorships total $52 mill. Let's be generous and say that half of that comes from private sources (in fact, most of these grants are coming from other government funded organizations). A big contributions to NPR's top line is from the NPR Foundation, which gave 15 mill in 2008. ...but look back at the 2005 numbers, and it was just 1.7 mill. Why the huge (1,000 %) increase in money from the NPR foundation? Read the NPR Foundation's reports and the Consolidated reports http://www.npr.org/about/statements/fy2008/fy08nprfoundationreport.pdf http://www.npr.org/about/statements/fy2008/fy08consolidatedreport.pdf and you can see that they've been investing in highly leveraged hedge funds and interest rate swap contracts these past few years. To put it mildly, this doesn't look like sustainable money. Putting aside the non-sustainable NPR Foundation money, the federal government makes up $90 mill of NPR's after-removing-the-Foundation revenues of $152 mill. So, where does NPR get its money? * federal dollars: 60% * individual contributions: 1.5% * advertising, misc: 38.5%
- frossie 17y ago
  A typical affiliate gets two thirds or more of its budget from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting Can you source this statement? My local affiliate, for example, is 63% funded by individual contributions. Not that I disagree with the overall point - organisations that are publically funded (NPR, BBC, CBC, etc) are more likely to put their IP out there for everybody and to do non-sexy reporting. I see this as an entirely good thing and possibly one of the best uses that my tax money is put to.

by AndrewO 17y ago

tjic 17y ago

This is blatantly false, for reasons I'll explain below. Also, you're conflating NPR (NPR, Inc.) with member stations. These are different entities. The topic is NPR. The numbers that you cite are not numbers for NPR. They are not even number for NPR member stations. They are aggregate numbers for public broadcasting stations ... including those not affiliated with NPR. Getting the truth out of NPR's reports can be tricky. They haven't filed an annual report in four years, and the financials are split up between NPR, Inc., the NPR foundation, the CPB, and various member stations. You have to read a LOT of documents to figure out some of this stuff. Let's start with NPR's financial documents. http://www.npr.org/about/statements/fy2008/fy08nprincreport.pdf I note $2.5 million in membership dues (individual donations) out of $172 mill total. Thus, individual subscribers and pledges make up 1.45% of NPR's budget. $68 million comes from station programming fees. What are these? These are fees that local affiliates pay to National Public Radio, Inc. Where do those dollars come from? A typical affiliate gets two thirds or more of its budget from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting. The CPB is a shell corporation / funnel that connects federal dollars to NPR with a cut-out step. See the CPB financials here: http://www.cpb.org/aboutcpb/financials/budget/ The CPB gets $400 million per year from taxes, takes 10% off the top for operations, and funnels 90% of the money to local affiliates, which then funnel most of the money back to NPR. The data that you cite about the sources of funding are not for typical NPR affiliate stations: first, it includes many stations that aren't NPR stations, then it excludes many stations that are NPR stations (they mention this in a footnote). Where else does NPR get its revenue? Grants, contributions, and sponsorships total $52 mill. Let's be generous and say that half of that comes from private sources (in fact, most of these grants are coming from other government funded organizations). A big contributions to NPR's top line is from the NPR Foundation, which gave 15 mill in 2008. ...but look back at the 2005 numbers, and it was just 1.7 mill. Why the huge (1,000 %) increase in money from the NPR foundation? Read the NPR Foundation's reports and the Consolidated reports http://www.npr.org/about/statements/fy2008/fy08nprfoundationreport.pdf http://www.npr.org/about/statements/fy2008/fy08consolidatedreport.pdf and you can see that they've been investing in highly leveraged hedge funds and interest rate swap contracts these past few years. To put it mildly, this doesn't look like sustainable money. Putting aside the non-sustainable NPR Foundation money, the federal government makes up $90 mill of NPR's after-removing-the-Foundation revenues of $152 mill. So, where does NPR get its money? * federal dollars: 60% * individual contributions: 1.5% * advertising, misc: 38.5%

frossie 17y ago
A typical affiliate gets two thirds or more of its budget from the Corporation for Public Broadcasting Can you source this statement? My local affiliate, for example, is 63% funded by individual contributions. Not that I disagree with the overall point - organisations that are publically funded (NPR, BBC, CBC, etc) are more likely to put their IP out there for everybody and to do non-sexy reporting. I see this as an entirely good thing and possibly one of the best uses that my tax money is put to.