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NPR: Rolling In Green Stuff

F

FredLeonard

Guest
Technically, they are a "non-profit." So, they don't have profits to give to investors. Instead they have a huge "surplus" to play with - lots of money left over.

Here is the link to NPR's 2012 Consolidated Financial Statement. It's a PDF file and you need Adobe Acrobat Reader or Foxit or some other PDF reader to view it (available as free downloads).
http://www.npr.org/about/aboutnpr/statements/fy2012/FY12_Consolidated.pdf

Notice, as Carl Sagan used to say, we are talking about millions and millions of dollars.

Maybe public radio would get more people responding at pledge time if they were for-profit and did pay dividends with all that left-over money.

And even without government money, they are doing really well.
 
FredLeonard said:
Maybe public radio would get more people responding at pledge time if they were for-profit and did pay dividends with all that left-over money.
Click to expand...

Keep in mind that NPR, which does no on-air fundraising, doesn't own any of the radio stations that DO. So none of NPR's money is shared with its affiliates. However, since half of the Board of Directors is made up of station GMs, they would be quick to vote for a cut in programming fees if in fact NPR gets too fat.

To put this statement in context, NPR did post a $2.6 million deficite last year. So they seem to have solved that problem without any emergency measures. Last year there were some on this board who thought the loss would be made up by tax money, which (as I said then) didn't happen. NPR losses are not made up with tax money. Just as losses at our local church aren't made up with tax money.

Meanwhile, at public radio stations, things ARE very tough, especially in Republican states where the government has cut or eliminated state funding, and at stations owned by colleges or universities. So don't let the financials of one part of the public radio system distract from the overall situation.
 
aaronread said:
NPR has, for almost 30 years, IIRC, been effectively prohibited from soliciting funds directly from listeners...but the internet is finally starting to change that in major ways.
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The Board allowed NPR to directly pitch for funds during the 1983 financial crisis, which was exactly 30 years ago this month.

But the new funding system created after that crisis changed the way NPR received it's money. Rather than the bulk of its funding coming from CPB, the money instead comes from the stations. As a result, the Board feels that all on-air fundraising should only benefit stations. However, OFF-air fundraising is a different story.
 
As a result, the Board feels that all on-air fundraising should only benefit stations. However, OFF-air fundraising is a different story.
Click to expand...

Yep. And although everyone has known for ten years that the difference between on-air fundraising and off-air fundraising was going to disappear eventually, thanks to the internet and its wide-reaching impact, it's only recently that the problem has started to really become problematic for stations' bottom lines.

Personally I think Sutton's proposal makes a ton of sense. Which is, of course, why it won't happen. ::)
 
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