Monthly income turns to charity greed
Posted by: mermaid
22nd Oct 2009 11:50pm
This was met with much distaste amongst the large pool of volunteers, who questioned why? The manager shared the same view and set off to identify the need vs greed syndrome and this is what we learned.......
more than $210 billion of institutionalised ''charity'' is now part of Australia's society and is embedded in the economy rather than being an optional extra. Old-fashioned charity is just $9 billion, 4 per cent of the total or less than 3 per cent if we acknowledge governments' financial support to charities.
There are approximately 10,400 charities in Australia with almost 12,000 outlets or branches.
120,000 staff are employees vs tens of thousands of volunteers; this figure does not include volunteers who work for schools, clubs and associations. Total wages are about $3.9 billion.
Salvation Army (eastern and southern divisions only) revenue approx $650 million, smaller average less than $800,000 per year (a extraordinary figure).
Compare these figures to an average business employing staff, with a revenue of $3.8 million - or approx five times the average charity.
Reality is charities are a business and these figures are Australian, given the number of charity organisations in Australia also exist worldwide the math just does not add up.
When presenting these figures to senior management, the manager was told rising inflation restricted the charity from performing.
The result, the manager and 3/4's of the pooled volunteers left and within 2 years the charity have employed 4 managers. The days of charity truly have gone!
What are your thoughts?
SereneBee
- 17th Oct 2010 05:22pm
I volunteer at my local Vinnies op-shop and the big skip at the back is there because certain people in our society say this is too good to throw out so we'll donate it to charity. Many times we've been given clothes that have been washed but are still wet which we don't have the space because we have a very small shop with no washing/drying facilities - we do iron everything that comes in clean, I do a lot of sewing repairs - hems, seams, buttons etc. I'm sure some people only donate stained clothing which we won't sell. I could go on but I think you probably get the picture. We have many people come in with 'vouchers' meaning after being assessed they get usually $100 FREE either clothes or household linen.
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