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Comment by matt_morgan | Hacker News Reader

This quote--

"...the median age of NPR’s radio audience has steadily climbed from roughly 45 years old two decades ago to 54 last year—and one it would need to reach in order to guarantee its survival."

I've been in nonprofits since 1993. My wife has been in different nonprofits since 1998. My friends are mostly in nonprofits. Every single one I'm aware of--with the possible exception of NYPL--has dealt/is dealing with an aging constituent base. Every interview I go on, they want to know what I can do to help them reach, court, and convert young people.

Not to diminish NPR's problem ... that's a pretty fast aging rate compared to some others I've seen. But clearly there is something going on here that's bigger than NPR.

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> Every interview I go on, they want to know what I can do to help them reach, court, and convert young people.

I don't think it's going to happen. The younger generations have been raised on a culture of collective, forced participation rather than voluntarism. Ironically, the community service many of them were forced to perform in order to graduate taught them not to volunteer. They are not members of churches, of civic associations, of non-profits: instead, then tend to call for others to fund their desired initiatives (i.e., for taxes rather than donations).

This is not an unintended consequence: a collective state cannot tolerate free association.

If my friends and colleagues are any indication (late-20s, midwest), the problem is not that we don't like non-profits or the work they do, it's that we don't have enough money to freely give.

My wife works in an art museum, and they have the same problem, but they've been trying very hard with events aimed at "millenials".

Some of that that probably comes from simple Baby Boomer demographics.

The median age of the US population increased from 32.9 in 1990 to 37.2 in 2010.

http://www.statista.com/statistics/241494/median-age-of-the-...

I'm sure there are some cultural shifts that might factor in for some organizations, such as the type of things in the article where there is a reluctance to fully embrace new media due to old bureaucratic structures and paradigms.

What have been some of the strategies suggested. There is a definite desire from the younger age groups to do something, but non-profits I have worked with or know are experiencing the same issue as you are seeing.

A professor of mine declared that he would donate to NPR when he had money, is it a case where the loan debts from the students is sapping the monies that used to go to the non-profits?

The general approach is "meet them where they are." I.e., throw parties with free-ish drinks, publish to & engage on social media, bring art to public spaces, etc.

There's often a "storytelling" kind of aspect too--take our artworks and stop being so fussy about them, tell a story that relates, etc. I haven't really seen that work in big numbers. E.g., The Metropolitan Museum of Art does tons of online storytelling, that gets small fractions of the traffic that goes to the Timeline of Art History and the Collections search and the online Exhibition components.

A couple other responses here mention a) millenials are struggling financially, and b) we're an aging population and the old man, he's got all the money. I think both are true. Lots of museums have experimented with low-cost memberships (Brooklyn Museum was a pioneer). But you can donate tiny amounts of money to NPR. Maybe it's a question of really meaning it when you say "every little bit counts."

Could it be economics? Baby boomers have relatively more discretionary income?

I've had tangential dealings with arts organizations based in San Francisco, and fundraising is pretty dire - donors are dying out, and despite the incredible amount of wealth in the area, younger folks aren't filling the gap. It's kind of a cultural thing. The same people who'll pay thousands of dollars for VIP tents at Coachella aren't interested in things like NPR, new music, choral groups, independent theater, or art galleries. In Europe, this is less of an issue because there are much greater government-sponsored art initiatives, but that sort of thing's been destroyed in the US both nationally and on a state-by-state basis.

Isn't paying for overpriced things at music festivals supporting the arts?

> In Europe, this is less of an issue because there are much greater government-sponsored art initiatives, but that sort of thing's been destroyed in the US both nationally and on a state-by-state basis.

Europe has a tradition of state funding; the U.S. has a dying tradition of voluntary funding.

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