The billionaire/nonprofit/progressive nexus
Battalions of local left-wing nonprofits advocate for extremist policies while at the same time benefiting from taxpayer and ultra-rich funder largesse. Joel Kotin at Philanthropy Daily suggests that this dynamic will lead to an ever more radical and well-funded nonprofit agenda, putting it on a collision course with centrist and mainstream communities.
In an increasingly nationalized and globalized era, the charitable impulses are increasingly wide and diffused, less focused on personal improvement but in service to a distinct ideology, usually far to the left, but also on the libertarian right.
The predilections of the ultra-rich will likely loom over politics and policy debates for decades to come. In the U.S., nonprofits’ assets have grown nine-fold since 1980. In 2020, nonprofits brought in $2.62 trillion in revenues, constituting more than 5.6% of the U.S. economy. And this process is just beginning, as the boomers begin to leave behind their riches. The consulting firm Accenture projects that the Silent Generation and baby boomers will gift their heirs up to $30 trillion by 2030, and up to $75 trillion by 2060.
Yet this bounty will be highly limited due to the rapid concentration of assets in ever fewer hands, with the top 1% in the U.S. increasing their share by roughly 50% since 2002.
The new money is strikingly different and much younger in contrast to more-conservative funders like Charles Koch, Oracle founder Larry Ellison, Rupert Murdoch, and the Irvine Company chairman Don Bren, all well into their 70s or 80s. They are increasingly outdone by the more-youthful “enlightened” rich, who have consistently outraised and outspent the political “right” in recent years by a margin of nearly 2 to 1.
The next generation of tech and finance heirs, such as the socialist offspring of the founders of Qualcomm, could prove even more radical. They have founded nonprofits that, notes The New York Times, financed by “rich kids who want to tear down capitalism.” Born into the oligarchy, these young trust-funders do not have to worry if their activities bother customers or even undermine the business that created their fortunes.
To some extent, the tech oligarchs see themselves and are seen by some progressives as what progressive writer David Callahan describes as a kind of “benign plutocracy,” in contrast to those who built their fortunes on resource extraction, manufacturing, and material consumption.(1) But the more-radical policies supported by the left-dominated nonprofits could ultimately also undermine even their own privileges. Like French aristocrats before the Revolution, they may be financing causes that threaten “their own rights and even their existence,” as Tocqueville noted.
In the future, it’s likely that agitated young activists won’t long tolerate billionaires who lament climate change, but fly their private jets to discuss the “crisis” in places like Davos. After all, if the world is on the verge of a global apocalypse, how can the luxurious lifestyles of so many of the world’s most-public green advocates be acceptable? Ironically, much of this wealth was generated by a carbon-based economy that they are now trying to destroy as rapidly as possible.
Like their aristocratic forebears, our elites even have created their own set of convenient “indulgences,” such as using offsets to make up for their often-large carbon footprint. These groups, notes one British journalist, tend to embrace a “pre-existing culture of misanthropic dread” that also enhances their power. Worried about the apocalypse, they want the next generation to cut back, while they fight the good fight in genteel style; as The Guardian noted, the oligarchs of Wall Street, Hollywood, and Silicon Valley travel to Davos in an estimated 1,500 GHG-spewing private jets.
This hypocrisy will eventually result in growing pressure against capitalism, which many of the progressive greens see as the major contributor to climate change. The red-green contingent generally agrees with the view of Barry Commoner, a founding father of modern environmentalism, that “Capitalism is the earth’s number one enemy.” Others favor “net-zero” and “de-growth” policies that would hurt working- and middle-class Americans, who would then need ever more support from the state. This money could only come from the ultra-rich.
The current oligarchs may deserve opprobrium, but the ultimate danger posed by the nonprofit tsunami lies in their feckless embrace of a policy agenda that undermines the very essence of competitive capitalism. Like feudal lords, this new elite, emboldened by a common ideology, may continue to thrive in a world of frozen social relations, but only by destroying the very system that brought them their own good fortune—and that could someday threaten even their own privileged position.
This article originally appeared in Philanthropy Daily. Read the whole thing here.
This article is part of an exclusive Opp Now series on hazy, shady, and all-out criminal relationships between local nonprofits/gov't:
Jonathan Fleming, founder and director of SVPAF, speaks to what's going on with SJ's nonprofit community.
Joel Kotin at Philanthropy Daily analyzes the worrisome dynamic of local left-wing nonprofits advocating for extremist policies while at the same time benefiting from taxpayer and ultra-rich funder largesse.
Nonprofit attorney Scott Hartley of Hartley Law clarifies the parameters that apply to nonprofits when it comes to political activity.
SFStandard.com reports on how nonprofits in San Francisco can leverage huge sums of taxpayer dollars for political activity while neglecting their core mission.
Planning Commissioner chair Pierluigi Oliverio offers a compromise in the ongoing dispute over whether local progressive nonprofits break regulations with their aggressive lobbying of City staff /politicians: treat all advocacy activity the same.
Josh Koehn explains in the SF Standard that many residents are urging for transparency in how NP partners address objectives and use taxpayer funds. However, local nonprofit lobbyists strongly request no additional stipulations be enforced—lest the paperwork adds up.
The HJTA's Susan Shelley untangles LA's recently-passed Measure ULA. Residents making high-value real estate transactions must fork over some big coin, but none of it will go to emergency shelters or transitional housing—just unaccountable nonprofits peddling the discredited Housing First mantra.
David Eisbach points out the consequences of COPA's underlying idea: that unhoused people must rely on larger entities to advance in life. Putting nonprofit orgs in a tremendous position of power over lower-income SJ residents/officials will compound conflict-of-interest problems.
Gov't misconduct expert Josh Koehn reports on a new lawsuit against SF nonprofit org the United Council of Human Services, which alleges that CEO Gwendolyn Westbrook has inappropriately used funds for personal benefit.
Local nonprofits act just like lobbyists (but retain their tax exempt status) and brazenly invite conflict of interest concerns. Joel Kotkin provides the backstory in Philanthropy Daily.
Local neighborhood coalition Families & Homes SJ wonders how it's okay that the city's Housing Director can sit on the board of a local housing nonprofit.
SF org Clean City Coalition is alleged to have engaged in highly illegal, dangerous money laundering behaviors.
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