Nonprofit Executive Compensation Under Scrutiny

With increased scrutiny from the IRS, various state regulators, the media, and even donors and funders, nonprofits need to be able to show that their executive compensation is reasonable. The newly-released 2011 All Nonprofits Salary Survey published by ERI Salary Surveys provides reliable comparable data for 20 executive positions, as well as 151 non-management benchmark jobs, accompanied by verifying source comparisons used by the IRS, courts, and thousands of ERI Economic Research Institute Assessor Series subscribers.

The survey reports market-based pay data covering approximately 12,000 incumbents in nonprofit organizations across the United States. Unique participant data is complemented by two of four distinct salary survey data collections for either management or non-management families. The result is a comprehensive analysis of up to three verified sources for a particular benchmark job. Sources include ERI's exclusively licensed Executive Compensation Assessor and Salary Assessor (both with for-profit data), along with ERI's Nonprofit Comparables Assessor and Tax-Exempt Survey databases.

The 2011 All Nonprofits Salary Survey affords tax-exempt organizations comparable data to aid compliance with reporting executive salaries on IRS Form 990. Information for each job title includes a job description and data for total compensation, averages, percentile ranges, variable pay, and more. Breakouts of the survey are available by the size of the organization, as well as by state. ERI Salary Surveys also provides sector-specific nonprofit surveys ranging from arts, culture and humanities, to social science services and research, for organizations both large and small.

In addition to compensation data, ERI Salary Surveys offers two surveys exclusively detailing employee benefits. The first, 2011 Benefits in Nonprofit Organizations identifies trends in nonprofit medical and dental coverage, as well as retirement plans and paid-leave options, among other benefits. The second, 2011 Health Care Benefits Benchmarking Survey compares health care benefits among the nonprofit, for-profit, and government sectors.

Nonprofit surveys are available for online purchase at www.salary-surveys.eri.com. Participation in 2012 surveys opens October 1, 2011. Organizations that contribute information receive a 50 percent discount on the survey purchased and a complimentary copy of the Executive Summary. Participation is not required to purchase surveys.