More on the Funding Gap

I have some quibbles with this article (I'm not sure Rock the Vote should count as a progressive youth organization, and many new organizations are not included in her figures), but Iara Peng of Young People For speaks truth about the state of progressive youth funding (emphasis mine):

Last year alone, the Right invested $48 million in 11 youth-focused organizations aimed at increasing the number of ideologically friendly campus papers, fostering networks of students on campuses, shifting the way that students self-identify in terms of political ideology, providing skills and strategies training, and promoting right-wing values.

...

Collectively, we're (youth groups) doing great work, but we're not doing enough. Right-wing groups spend more than ten times as much on long-term political leadership development than we do, and financial trends over the past four years show that progressive leadership development organizations are actually, on average, experiencing a decline in revenue. Unlike their conservative counterparts, youth-focused progressive organizations are often funded with a "buying," not "building," mentality, meaning that donors want their contribution to have immediate payoffs, such as election-year voter registration, but are not focusing on investing in the strategic, long-term sustainability of those organizations.

The folks at Emerging Democratic Majority agree with Peng's assessment, and are encouraging progressives to donate more to youth training and mentorship.

Most interesting to me is the $48 million figure for conservative youth funding. That's roughly equivalent to all the money distributed last year by the Democracy Alliance.

That's not just short-sighted or disconcerting, its shameful.