It would be nice if organisations were run by people who were so dedicated to the job that they'd do it for free or at least on a survival wage, but it is difficult to find someone with both the right qualifications and the willingness to do it cheaply.

The figures aren't outrageous for those positions and as a non-profit they do have a board who made the decision to pay those amounts.

It's not like a private company where the owner/CEO can just grab the money. The board members voted to hire someone and offered those amounts.

If you want to change this kind of thing, you need to attend the annual meeting in which the board is elected. I've been elected to a few board positions in non-profit organisations and let me tell you: It's really easy to get on a board. Most places have difficulties filling the positions or you can easily outcompete other candidates simply by wanting to be there. It's boring as fuck, but important stuff sometimes happens and it's a good experience to have.

So if you want to actually contribute to that non-profit, you might want to save your few dollars and instead give them some of your time to help them in the right direction. Assuming you're dedicated to the cause in the first place that is. If you have something to say, you will be heard, because quite frankly, half the board members only come for the free food.

Here's the thing: I don't know about this charity in particular. But in general, a big charity is just as complicated a business as a big for profit company.
The task of managing it isn't any easier. So the people who have experience in managing big businesses can get that kind of money elsewhere, too.
In our system, the charity is pretty much forced to pay competitive CEO salaries if they want experienced people at the helm.
If they paid much less, they wouldn't get anyone to do the job who's actually competent.

Okay, so think about it like this:

Suppose your job is making wooden chairs. It's takes you the exact same skills to make a wooden chair to sell for profit, as it does to make a wooden chair to donate to a chairless children's charity, right? So why would you spend all your time and skills doing a job that's eventually going to bankrupt you? While you might do a few chairs because you feel like it's morally right, the bulk of your work is going to be selling chairs because that's how you sustain yourself.

CEOs are in the same situation. A 500-person for-profit company takes the exact same skill set to run as a 500-person non-profit. So the reality is that non-profits need to either be competitive in pay with for-profits, or they have to be attractive in ways other than compensation so they can entice CEOs to work for them.

Now, none of that is to say that the scale of CEO compensation is appropriate, because it's not. But that's the calculus a non-profit has to make.

Indeed , disgusting and out of control. Start taxing their asses.

Philanthropy officer getting paid the least, right behind the actual zoo director.

Every dollar you give feeds an animal.

for me its more like whats the lowest paid worker. Nowadays you are going to have trouble under six figures in any major city and the ceo is not much over 10x that. Now I doubt the lowest paid worker makes that but it would be great if they did.

Wow, that's crazy. I just checked out my local zoo and there are only 2 executives with a pay package of $200k. The rest are unpaid trustees.

That's why I'm very picky about donating. When I was at my very first job, pushing 1200 packages an hour at UPS for hourly wages, I donated to the United Way via payroll deduction. I was listening to the news in my car when I heard the CEO of United Way took his family on a $2M vacation. I had that payroll deduction removed on the very next shift.

Unpopular opinion: Charities should be morally allowed to compete for top talent on a financial basis.

Damn, my work at a non profit yields me free coffee and water. I think I'm underselling myself

It's not exactly the charities fault.

The real issue is that for profit companies can pay their CEOs this much, which means charities have to compete if they want a good CEO too.

In reality we should be cracking down on companies hoarding wealth towards to their CEOs at exorbitant rates, that way charities won't have to pay a wage like this just to function and even hire a CEO.