$1 million+ salaries at nonprofits

John Ryan of KUOW-Puget Sound Public Radio tracked salaries at area nonprofit hospitals and found that many executives earned at least $1 million a year as their hospitals faced layoffs and budget cuts.
Ryan used the 990 tax returns that nonprofits must file with the IRS to collect much of the data for the story, which included an online list of the top 51 salaries. He also cited salaries for other hospital workers to put the numbers in perspective and included comments from the head of Charity Navigator, a watchdog group. Ryan provides more details about how he reported the segment.

Today’s Tip: Like publicly traded companies, nonprofit companies have to keep a public paper trail. You can access these files by registering for free at Guidestar.

If the filings on Guidestar aren’t as recent as you might like, you can contact the hospital or other nonprofit for any more recent filings, which are public documents.

In addition to salary information, hospital 990s can also be useful in determining other financial details, including the institutions’ investment income and its highest-paid contractor. For more information on dissecting 990s, check out these articles by Bill Smith and Chris Roush in the nonprofits section of businessjournalism.org.