Comment on Local charity shop rejects pre-spychip PCs. Then they get destroyed.
MrEff@lemmy.world 17 hours agoI don’t think you know what you are talking about with non-profits. I used to have one for my reddit socials group. I founded it and was the president/ceo for about 8 years. I can tell you right now, you can definately run it as a for profit. In fact, there is a specific dollar amount you can profit off it. Every year when I submitted financial documents to the state I had to show generally (high level only, not specific) every dollar that came in or out, but they didn’t care about where it came from or where it went to. The only real question was if I had over exactly $1 million in profit. Obviously I never did, but if I did there would simply be a slightly different set of rules on what I would have to do with it or how to declare it. If I had a non-profit that sold computers and made $999,999 per year, then paid myself or banked all of that, then I am still a perfectly legal non-profit and don’t need to report any details on my finances other than general numbers.
And as far as financials related to the mission? Literally nothing stopping me from spending it on whatever I feel like. If my mission is slinging used computers to help kids with cancer- i can buy a fucking yacht with all my computer sales money under the non-profit then donate $1 to st.judes. This is why millionares and billionaires love to found their own charity and wash money through it. The rules are so gray.
Want to know the most common bullshit with non-profits if you still don’t believe me? Look up Equine Therapy non-profits. It is how you make your horse(s), stable, and pasture all sheltered as a non-profit. Then once a year you have some nondescript person ride one of your horses and count it as your charity event to justify the existence. I know so many people who own horses who do this bullshit to help cover the cost of owning them. And most of these people aren’t even that rich, just well off. And again, totally legal.
evenwicht@lemmy.sdf.org 17 hours ago
None of this obviates my thesis. A profit limit of $999,999 in your country reflects a buffer for ops. That’s has no material relevance here. Nor does it support the other Cloudflare user who claimed the charity activity of selling old machines is not viable. To claim that it’s not possible to sell old machines (even at a loss) and yet sustain, this makes it hard to believe you really know how non-profits work.
Indeed it is well known that non-profits have countless angles for abuse. People like Peter Thiel and other right-wing pricks notoriously abuse non-profit charity structure. That’s mostly irrelevant but to the extent that it’s relevant it actually supports my thesis nonetheless.