[rlmorel]

LOL...as for a difference, I would guess that MY organization provides goods and services appreciated by the consumers of those services and the community in general, and THOSE organizations are devoted to destroying the country that gives them their tax-exempt status!

[Mamzelle]

Commonly hospitals have a not-for-profit status as a way to run their business and have certain tax-exempt privileges and also some legal liability protections. Tax-exempt does not mean that when people give the hospital money that it is deductable from that person's income taxes. It just means that the hospital does not have to pay taxes on its "profits," such as they are.

Those same hospitals may have nonprofit "foundations" that fundraise like a charity with the donations being tax-deductable for people who donate to that foundation. These are often directed at purchases of equipment and facilities.

You may be farther away from working for a nonprofit than you realize.

I think the distinction is important because I happen to know some really rich people who run, IMO, phony-baloney foundations that I'd term "vanity charities." I rather despise the way they've turned a self-serving hobby enterprise into a fatuous "philanthropy."