Creating A More Equitable Movement: Compensation In The Farmed Animal Advocacy Sector
Background
The farmed animal advocacy movement has professionalized and grown within the nonprofit sector over the last 50 years, with over 285 organizations in the United States alone and more than 800 groups worldwide (Animal Charity Evaluators, 2023). The movement continues to grow, with new organizations launching or being developed through incubation programs each year. This report will analyze pay and benefit trends among farmed animal organizations and how they compare with nonprofits in other cause areas. Our goal is to provide benchmarks, recommendations, and tools in order to help strengthen this rapidly growing movement.
In general, nonprofit organizations face many complexities and barriers to providing competitive pay and benefits: 66% cite budget constraints/insufficient funding and 72% cite pay competition as barriers to hiring and retaining employees (The National Council of Nonprofits, 2023). In particular, the farmed animal protection movement faces unique funding constraints: only 3% of charitable giving is awarded to animal and environmental causes combined (Giving USA, 2021), and most of the funding for animal charities goes towards companion animals (Animal Charity Evaluators, 2023).
Low pay and inadequate benefits can lead to employee turnover. Faunalytics (2020) found that 21% of animal advocates in the U.S. and Canada left an animal advocacy job because of dissatisfaction with pay and benefits. In the same study, advocates who were members of marginalized groups (BIPOC, disability, LGBTQ2IA+) were significantly more likely to list low pay as a reason for leaving compared to non-marginalized advocates, indicating that the animal advocacy movement likely faces challenges in welcoming and retaining animal advocates from marginalized groups.
In order to provide more professional environments and competitive pay and benefits, we first need to understand how much pay and what type of benefits we’re providing to employees. This is the first report to compare the pay of U.S. employees between farmed animal advocacy organizations of similarly-sized revenues, as well as the benefits offered by U.S. organizations.
We also examined whether pay gaps exist between marginalized and non-marginalized individuals in the farmed animal advocacy movement (hereinafter referred to as the movement), given that such pay gaps are common across many sectors. For example, as of 2016, white men in the U.S. earned $24 per hour, while Hispanic and Black women earned $12 to $13 per hour, even after accounting for any differences in education levels (Pew Research Center, 2016). Similar pay gaps have been found in the U.S. work sector between people with and without a disability (American Institutes For Research, 2014) and between LGBTQ2IA+ and non-LGBTQ2IA+ individuals (Human Rights Campaign Foundation, 2022). We therefore hypothesized that people who are BIPOC (i.e., Black, Indigenous, or People of Color), women, non-binary, LGBTQ2IA+, and/or have a disability would earn less money than everyone else in our movement as well.
By addressing pay inequities and developing a purposeful approach to pay and benefits, organizations can create a more inclusive, equitable, and engaged work environment where staff feel more supported and rewarded. Such environments will also help employers attract and retain diverse talent within the organization and movement.
A Note On Interpretation
While this report attempts to summarize pay practices within the movement, readers should be aware that the final sample size is limited, based on 358 U.S. jobs from 40 organizations. We surveyed 27 of these organizations about their pay practices and most of them have a streamlined pay process and/or are already involved in promoting positive change (capacity-builders).
Similarly, BIPOC advocates, non-binary/other gender advocates, and advocates with a disability are likely underrepresented in our individual survey, while those with a graduate or professional degree are likely overrepresented.
In other words, our results don’t represent the full range of pay practices within the movement, nor do they fully represent the advocate population. Organizational leadership is therefore advised to use multiple data sources in addition to this report to make any pay decisions at their organization.
Lastly, this report doesn’t constitute legal advice or guidance. Employers are responsible for clarifying and complying with any legal regulations that apply to their organization and their workforce.
Key Findings
- The median pay across all U.S. farmed animal advocacy positions in our sample was approximately $80,000, but organizations with higher revenue and more staff tend to pay more than lower-revenue, smaller organizations. Organizations with a revenue over $1 million paid a median salary of $84,000 across all job levels compared to a median salary of $68,350 for organizations with a revenue below $1 million. Organizations with 1 to 10 employees paid a median salary of $70,000 across all job levels compared to a median salary of $81,800 for organizations with 11 or more employees. See Tables 1 to 5 below for details.
- Advocates from marginalized groups earned 85 cents for every dollar that a non-marginalized advocate makes. On average, advocates who are members of marginalized groups (identifying as BIPOC, having a disability, and/or being LGBTQIA+) received salaries that are 15% lower than the salaries of non-marginalized advocates. This statistically significant difference (p <.05) isn’t due to employment differences such as job level or years of experience, which we accounted for in our analyses. Even though most participating organizations had transparent and formal pay practices, this finding suggests that these strategies alone may not be enough to prevent or eliminate these pay gaps. See Figure 1 below for more.
- Pay corresponds with job level to a greater extent at higher-revenue organizations. At organizations with a revenue over $1 million, the median salary was $67,250 for individual contributors, $84,500 for management, $114,000 for leadership, and $128,000 for executive directors. In contrast, median salaries at organizations with a revenue under $1 million were much flatter, around $70,000 at each job level.
- Most U.S. farmed animal advocacy organizations we surveyed provide a medical plan, but dental, retirement, and vision benefits are less common. While 78% of participating organizations offered a medical plan, only 56% provided dental benefits, 52% offered a retirement plan, and 44% provided vision care benefits. For paid time off, all participating organizations offered a minimum of 15 vacation days, 84% offered at least five sick days, and 80% offered at least 10 holidays.
- Median executive director (ED) salaries were generally lower than EDs of social advocacy and environmental organizations, especially for EDs of lower-revenue farmed animal advocacy organizations. Comparing our sample of EDs against U.S.-wide ED data from Candid, EDs of lower-revenue farmed animal advocacy organizations (< $1 million) make $20,000 to $25,000 less than EDs of social advocacy and environmental organizations with a similar revenue, while EDs of higher-revenue farmed animal advocacy organizations ($1 million +) make approximately $2,000 and $7,000 less. Our median ED salaries tended to be higher than the median for Candid’s category of “animal-related organizations” ($70,000 vs. $65,262 for organizations < $1 million and $128,000 vs. $98,375 for organizations > $1 million). However, we suspect this is due to Candid’s category being dominated by direct work with animals (e.g., animal services, zoos, and aquariums).
- 36% of farmed animal advocates said they were somewhat or very likely to leave the movement if offered a similar role with better pay, particularly if they belonged to a marginalized group. 45% of marginalized participants were somewhat or very likely to leave compared to just 29% of non-marginalized participants (p = 0.05). While we don’t know whether this marginal difference would appear in a sample of advocates who haven’t obtained higher education, it suggests that our movement is at risk of losing talent, especially those belonging to marginalized groups.
- When given an opportunity to discuss barriers to pay, most organizational leadership said that they want to increase pay and know their employees are worth more, but can’t afford it due to funding constraints. Most organizations sampled have a formal pay process (70%) and determine raises based on cost of living (70%), although a few participants said that considering cost of living standards made determining equitable pay more challenging (e.g., when employing individuals from different countries and regions). Despite such barriers, most participating organizations are transparent about pay with their staff (78%), which is an important step in establishing pay equity. To gain a more comprehensive understanding of organizational barriers, we suggest reading our accompanying blog on this subject.
Recommendations
For Organization Leadership
- Be transparent with your staff about how you determine pay and benefits, including limitations, and regularly review these processes. When creating job listings, state the pay range and the types of benefits offered in the job description. Ensure that staff understand how and when pay ranges, pay raises, and benefits are determined, including how funding constraints may limit the type of compensation offered (e.g., having the funds to only improve benefits, but not salaries). Encourage open dialogue around pay and benefits by surveying your employees’ satisfaction on compensation and soliciting their feedback. We also recommend that you engage with a human resources or compensation specialist to periodically review and compare your salaries and benefits against current market rates, inflation, and legal requirements.
- Advocate for competitive pay and benefits for your employees, demonstrating the importance with our cost-of-turnover calculator. Increasing employee compensation can be expensive, but the hidden costs of turnover may be even more so. With this customizable calculator to help you estimate turnover costs that apply to your situation, we hope to provide a tool you can use to demonstrate the concrete impact of losing an employee when making difficult budgeting decisions and seeking funding. That said, beyond its economic impact, it is important to also convey that turnover may increase other team members’ workloads, reduce morale, and contribute to work-related stress or burnout.
- Assess whether pay gaps exist in your organization and where they are stemming from. Collect self-reported demographic information from your employees on an optional basis, and compare pay between marginalized and non-marginalized staff to evaluate and address potential pay gaps. Additionally, you can work to challenge dominant practices that advantage privileged employees, as recommended by equity firms: Acknowledge the documented “white advantage” in nonprofit leadership positions, improve hiring and promotional practices to ensure that marginalized individuals are given equal opportunities for employment and advancement, and invest more in mentoring and professional development opportunities to support employees on their career journey. These steps can help minimize or prevent pay gaps.
- Consult a human resources or compensation specialist to help you implement a pay and benefit process that meets your organization’s needs and budget. You can also incorporate information from online resources to inform your pay and benefit approach (e.g., salary.com or payscale.com). You can also engage a benefit specialist or broker to assess the feasibility of improving benefit offerings for your employees. Additionally, be aware of changing laws (e.g., overtime eligibility) and increasing employer obligations around pay transparency regulations.
For Employees & Potential Employees
- Request transparency from organization leadership about how pay and benefits are determined, and how funding affects that. Compensation transparency helps ensure employees are being treated fairly while holding employers accountable. If your employer doesn’t do so already, encourage them to conduct employee feedback surveys and hold forums for employees to discuss how their employers can better support their needs. Further, it’s important to learn and acknowledge that leaders work with a limited budget, especially across the long-term, meaning that leaders may not be able to improve pay and benefits if the organization runs the risk of losing funding or is simply not in a financial position to do so.
- Be realistic with yourself and prospective employers about what you need from a job, including salary and benefits. This report can’t tell you what you should be paid for your work. It gives a rough sense of the current reality of the movement—within the limitations of a small sample—but everyone’s needs are different. Change is unlikely to happen overnight. Our movement is underfunded compared to others and until that changes, many people will struggle to survive on our salaries, especially BIPOC, who are less likely to have another source of household income and are more likely to support other family members (Building Movement Project, 2020). If working in the movement doesn’t provide you with a living wage and benefits, being transparent about that as a reason for working elsewhere is the most supportive action you can take.
For Funders
Without major funders’ support, it’s difficult or impossible for organizations to compensate their staff at a level that encourages retention.
- Fund salaries and other operating costs. Our data point to the need for fair compensation to retain employees. High turnover makes it more expensive for nonprofits to help animals, as our cost-of-turnover calculator helps estimate. Aim to fund salaries that are closer to the nonprofit market rates. You can also support organizational health by providing funding to grantees for external human resources and compensation consultants to audit their pay and benefits package or help them develop a formal process for determining compensation. In addition, whenever possible, provide multi-year funding commitments so that organizations can strategize long-term.
- Encourage grantees to be transparent about their compensation practices and remove potential sources of bias. This can be done by providing funding for grantees to investigate whether pay disparities exist in their organizations and to put equitable pay in place for all staff.
Applying These Findings
We understand that reports like this have a lot of information to consider and that acting on research can be challenging. Faunalytics is happy to offer pro bono support to advocates and nonprofit organizations who would like guidance applying these findings to their own work. Please visit our virtual Office Hours or contact us for support. Additionally, you can contact Culture Canopy for select pro bono People & Culture support and guidance with developing or reviewing your organization’s total compensation philosophy and strategy.
For an in-depth, accessible overview of this study’s findings in video format, be sure to check out the webinar below.
Behind The Project
Research Team
The project’s lead author was Research Scientist Dr. Andrea Polanco (Faunalytics) and Dr. Jo Anderson (Faunalytics) reviewed and oversaw the work.
Acknowledgements
We would like to thank Jay Barrett (Culture Canopy) and Richard Gathercole (Reward Guru) for providing pro-bono support, including support with analyzing the pay and benefit data and advising on the research design, analyses, and reporting. We would also like to thank Brooke Haggerty and several advocates who provided valuable input about this research throughout the process. Lastly, we would like to thank our funders for their generous support of this research.
Research Terminology
At Faunalytics, we strive to make research accessible to everyone. We avoid jargon and technical terminology as much as possible in our reports. If you do encounter an unfamiliar term or phrase, check out the Faunalytics Glossary for user-friendly definitions and examples.
Research Ethics Statement
As with all of Faunalytics’ original research, this study was conducted according to the standards outlined in our Research Ethics and Data Handling Policy.
Additionally, this study was conducted in strict accordance with the ethical guidelines and principles outlined by the Research Ethics Board by Carleton University (approval reference number 119576).
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Citations:
Polanco, A., & Anderson, J. (2024). Creating A More Equitable Movement: Compensation In The Farmed Animal Advocacy Sector. Faunalytics. https://faunalytics.org/compensation-in-farmed-animal-advocacy/
