I will see articles on CNN alluding to the notion that the NRA is funded primarily by manufacturers rather than being a grassroots organization. Is this true?
Thanks,
Rob
Let’s see: NRA annual budget: $200-240M. Total membership fees - ~$150M (sounds about right - 4.3M members times $35 fee).
No, not astroturf.
Who are the majority stockholders, so to speak? Who are the top ten contributors?
No idea. I was responding to the OP who questioned whether “NRA is funded **primarily **by manufacturers”. I showed that it is funded **primarily **by member fees.
The New York Times reports an annual budget of $300 million.
If NRA membership is 4.3 million as you state @ $35 a pop, the shortfall does indicate outside income is equal to, or greater than membership fees.
Do they ever go back and purge the lifetime members who’s memberships have expired, so to speak? I’ve often wondered if their membership roles might be slightly inflated by that, since IIRC, the lifetime memberships used to be super cheap. Of course, for the purposes of this thread, I suppose their operating budget is also bolstered by people buying the lifetimes this year.
Questions like this without offering your own opinion is why some posters perceive you as anti-gun.
This is not mean as snark, just sayin’.
And Bloomberg Businessweek says their annual budget is $228M.
“Combined, sources such as fundraising, sales, advertising and royalties produced about $115 million in 2010, just over half the NRA’s $227.8 million in income, according to the group’s tax return. Most of the rest, about $100.5 million, came from membership dues. Other sources included program fees, sales of assets, investment income and subscriptions.”
It also documents the firearm-manufacturers’ donations:
“More than 50 firearms-related companies have given at least $14.8 million to the Fairfax, Virginia-based group, according to the NRA’s own list for a donor program that began in 2005.”
Not quite getting why you want someone to offer an opinion in a forum dedicated to facts. Or what’s wrong with a question that can be answered with facts.
Just sayin’.
Hard to say what total amount each member pays.
Some members pay less than the $35 and some pay a bit more. Since NRA offers lifetime memberships, these can fall into either class. Beyond that, NRA membership includes one magazine subscription, but there are two choices. (American Rifleman, or American Hunter) You can get both magazines for an extra fee. NRA does some sales of branded merchandise, and occasionally conducts raffles of commemorative firearms and the like.
NRA also has some partnership programs, like credit cards that feed 1% or so of purchases to the NRA, life insurance programs, etc. Such income streams are fairly common to non-profits…For a long time I had a credit card that helped my alumni association for example. Some gun dealers have programs where they donate $1 of each sale to the NRA, and one big mail-order outfit has a round-up program where you check a box and they round your order up to the nearest buck and send the change to the NRA…this is buisness support, but it is disclosed to the customer, so is really grass roots.
As for not purging lifetime members: While keeping them alive in spirit might be useful for intimidating politicians, there are real expenses of sending magazines, direct mailings, etc, and no additional income, so there is a strong financial motivation to keep it honest.
Lifetime members get a no-charge renewal post-card each year, to make sure you are still alive, information is current, do they want the other magazine now, etc. This is a simple way for heirs to notify the NRA of the passing of a member. Widows often find it distressing to receive mail addressed to the dead husband, so the heirs have that motivation to inform the NRA even before the annual postcard arrives. This fell to me when my dad died. The Rifleman and other magazines were easy to shut off…junk mail not so easy.
In addition to the NRA proper, there is a related lobbying group: NRA-ILA (Institute for Legislative Action). The NRA shares mailing lists with the ILA, but the finances are separate. It is possible that some reports of NRA finances might include or ignore the ILA, depending on which serves the agenda of the reporter. The ILA probably gets a lot more industry money than the NRA proper, but it also solicits donations (boy does it solicit!) from all NRA members via appeals in the NRA magazines, direct mailings, etc.
And here I thought that asking questions before forming opinions was the intelligent thing to do.
Silly, silly me.
The NRA also has members who would rather not be members. A few of my professors in Montana were distressed by the fact that membership in the local rifle range included membership in the NRA, since they enjoyed going target shooting, but did not want to support an organization that they disagreed with. I can’t imagine any accurate way of getting total numbers on that, though.
Cool. How is that relevant to the OP?
Not all monies that make it to the NRA’s coffers were originally meant for the NRA-free money with no obligation.
[Quote=NRA]
CORPORATE PARTNERS
HARLON CARTER | $5,000,000-$9,999,999
�Midway USA
JOE FOSS | $1,000,000-4,999,999
�Beretta USA Corporation
�Springfield Armory, Inc.
�Clayton Williams Energy, Inc.
�Pierce Bullet Seal Target Systems, LLC
GEORGE WASHINGTON | $500,000-$999,999
�Cabela’s
�Brownells
�Big Sky Carvers
�Dillon Precision Products Corp., Inc.
�Benelli USA Corporation
�Leupold & Stevens, Inc.
�Xe, Inc.
�Sturm, Ruger & Co., Inc.
[/quote]
I pulled this from the NRA’s website.
What’s wrong with being anti-gun?
Because Hitler you know.
It’s relevant in that the OP is asking whether the NRA is an astroturf organization. They can hardly claim to be built on the support of their members if a significant portion of their membership doesn’t even want to be members. Is it a significant portion? As I said, I don’t know.
FWIW, I don’t have any sense that the NRA is astroturf. I think their membership numbers are inflated, yes, for all the reasons listed above - no purging of deceased members, counting everyone who’s dropped a raffle card in a box or bought a $20 lifetime membership, etc. Lots of orgs do the same thing.
I am surprised, actually, that they aren’t obviously and evidently supported by manufacturer and billionaire money. But whatever they are, they aren’t a phony group composed of three figureheads and a check from the Koch brothers.
I’m an NRA-certified rifle instructor. Or I should say, I was… I let my membership lapse a few years ago. I wasn’t happy with the NRA-ILA. I thought they compromised too much. I’m now a lifetime member of the GOA.