[Foundation-l] Corporate Social Responsibility

Sat Nov 20 05:27:14 UTC 2010

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On 19/11/2010 21:31, Risker wrote:
> The last one is for the fiscal year ending June 2009, and was filed on 29
> April 2010. Link:
> http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/foundation/5/54/WMF_2008_2009_Form_990.pdf
> 
> The section on salaries begins on Page 7.

Thank you for the links. I'm consulting the 990 form for 2008-2009 right
now [1]. Sadly, I already have questions:

Item 15 of page 1 says:
Salaries, other compensation, employee benefits:
Current year (2008-2009): 2,073,313 dollars.
(By the way, the annual report states another number: 2,257,621$. Why?)
With 26 employees declared at that time, it gives a mean salary of 6645$
a month for each employee. Isn't it morally a little high for a
non-profit organization and unfair towards the current 80 000 volunteers?

Also, at page 7, three major compensations are described:
Sue Gardner was compensated 175050$ (equivalent to a monthly 14587$ income)
Veronique Kessler was compensated 121859$ (equivalent to a monthly
10155$ income)
Mike Godwin was compensated 128139$ (equivalent to a monthly 10678$ income).

I don't live in the USA, but I'm surprised about these numbers. Frank
Bauer estimates that they "don't have the money to begin to pay for such
services at market rate".

The fact that this is legal or traditional is beside my point.
Though I'm willing to listen and understand the Foundation's way of
thinking, I'd like to express that for the cultural and ethical grounds
from where I come, it is unacceptable for someone to profit from
volunteers' efforts and from donations aimed at a cause. I'm not saying
this is the case, but I would gladly receive insightful answers because
I'm currently at loss about what to think of the Foundation.

[1]:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/foundation/5/54/WMF_2008_2009_Form_990.pdf
[2]:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/foundation/4/4f/FINAL_08_09From_KPMG.pdf

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