23. Not-for-Profit (definition)

A whole lot of corporations belong to a whole ‘nother sector that we’ll call “not-for-profit” because (surprise!) the corporations in that sector exist for other reasons than to make a profit. Now let’s be clear: not-for-profit corporations can’t just go around *losing* money all the time or else they would, well, die. They still have things like employees and equipment and office space and so on. All those things cost money, so not-for-profit corporations need to make money. Most of the time they even make a profit and use it to make their corporation bigger and better (sound familiar?). 

Not-for-profit corporations exist for all kinds of interesting reasons. A lot of the time they exist only because the people who built them want to make the world better, for instance by planting trees, or feeding hungry people. Sometimes they exist to get people elected, or to represent the interests of people who work in for-profit corporations, or to just think about things. In some of those cases, the corporations aren’t interested in making the world better at all… or if they are it’s mostly in an indirect way. 

The only real thing that not-for-profit corporations have in common with each other is that when they make a profit there are no shareholders to give the money to. Most not-for-profit corporations don’t have shareholders at all, meaning that nobody “owns” the corporation. Even in the cases where they *do* have owners, no matter how much profit a not-for-profit corporation makes, nobody can sell the corporation and make money.

Oh another thing that most not-for-profit corporations have in common is that they HAAATE being called “corporations,” which is kinda silly, actually. Their main objection is usually that they think they’re super different from for-profit corporations, which they’re not. After all, they still usually make a profit and use it to get bigger and better. Besides, you remember what a corporation is? It’s mostly about taxes and being sued and stuff – not about profit at all. One thing that happens when you start certain types of not-for-profit corporations is that you don’t pay ANY taxes! Anyway, not calling not-for-profits “corporations” is like refusing to use the word “leg” to refer to every leg. I mean, they’re all legs! So what if one of them has a maritime-themed mole on it?