He never gives to charity, but does not want people to think it is because he is penny pinching. He likes to respond to charity posts on Social Media to drop comments to signal that he is not donating because of some principled position. He hopes his family and friends will see his comments and admire his higher ideals. They all know he is a skinflint.
Even when he has money he never buys a round, presents for his children or flowers for his wife because these are all fripperies and pointless materialism. However the money he spends on himself buying games, drinking and buying takeouts for himself are essential expenditure.
He says that he thinks that CEO salaries are shocking and justify not donating. How right is he?
Below are some CEO salaries of prominent charities with the turnover and the CEO salary as a percentage of the turnover.
| Charity | year of data | CEO salary | Turnover | salary as % of turnover |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Age UK | 2015 | 190,000 | 86,400,000 | 0.22% |
| Shelter | 2017 | 122,500 | 58,000,000 | 0.21% |
| NSPCC | 2016 | 162,000 | 106,800,000 | 0.15% |
| British Heart Foundation | 2017 | 180,000 | 158,900,000 | 0.11% |
| Cancer Research UK | 2015 | 240,000 | 621,000,000 | 0.039% |
| Oxfam | 2021 | 120,936 | 400,000,000 | 0.031% |
While some of these salaries will seem to be substantial to most people, the amount as a percentage of turnover compares favourably with business sector renumerations. The Guardian compiled a list of business CEO salaries which ranged from 0.014 to 0.28% of company turnover.
Are charity CEO salaries excessive?
The answer to this depends on your attitude to whether charities should be professionally run. Some of them deal with substantial amounts of money and have staff to administer the work of the charities. These charities are being very successful at addressing the needs for which they were established to tackle. If the senior people were not paid suitable sums would they be able to attract the sort of people with the appropriate skills to achieve their aims?
They are typically lower as a percentage of turnover to that seen in the business sector. Given the apparent health of these charities, they look to be good value for the money.