Washington, D.C. · Nonprofit
TAXPAYERS FOR COMMON SENSE
TAXPAYERS FOR COMMON SENSE (Washington, D.C.) receives grants from 49 organizations whose IRS filings report $12,541,172 to it, the largest being RESOURCES LEGACY FUND ($2,535,334). 35 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- Revenue FY2024
- $1.8M
- Funders on record
- 49
- Grants received
- $13M
- Net assets
- $2.0M
What Taxpayers for Common Sense does
Mission
The mission of Taxpayers for Common Sense (tcs) is to achieve a government that spends taxpayer dollars responsibly and operates within its means. We work with the public, policymakers, and the media to increase transparency of the federal budget; expose and eliminate wasteful subsidies, earmarks, and corporate welfare; and monitor decisionmakers.
As stated on its FY2024 Form 990.
Programs
Agriculture program - tcs educates the public and policy makers about federal agriculture policy; emphasizing reforms to create a cost-effective and transparent safety net for agricultural producers; and ways to eliminate expensive subsidies and programs that waste taxpayer money. Activities included farm bill policy analysis and recommendations that would maximize the taxpayer benefits of federal subsidies; improving crop insurance compliance and reporting; monitoring and reporting conservation program performance; new or expanded subsidies for corn ethanol production and unsustainable biomass sources; expansion of federal mandates for corn ethanol and other corn-derived fuels; subsidies that artificially support specific industries. Tcs produced substantive posts on its website and social media, opinion pieces in media, and produced videos that were distributed on social media.
$350,844 spent21% of program spendingDisaster and wildfire -tcs works to educate the public about the increased costs of disasters and wildfires and the need to reform programs to more effectively and efficiently spend taxpayer dollars before disaster strikes.
$317,498 spent19% of program spendingEnvironmental and natural resources program - tcs works to ensure that the federal government manages taxpayer assets of public lands and waters in a manner that protects their value, delivers a fair return from private interest use, and avoids long term liabilities for the taxpayer. This includes work documenting taxpayer costs and liabilities associated with climate change and ways to mitigate those costs with less burden on future taxpayers. Tcs educates the public and policy makers about energy and natural resources policy, climate chabge impacts and policy, and works to eliminate harmful and wasteful spending that creates long term costs for taxpayers. Tcs covers a wide range of energy, public lands, and resources issues, producing and distributing educational materials such as, federal subsidies for biofuels and biomass energy; doe loan guarantee program; the cost of speculation in federal oil and gas leases; tcs routinely presents comments on administration rules and testifies before the house and senate. Reports, fact sheets, and analysis are made available to the public through the tcs website and are actively promoted through social media.
$838,334 spent51% of program spendingOther program services, not described on the e-filed return.
$136,475 spent8% of program spending
The 4 programs described on its FY2024 Form 990, listed largest first by expense. Program spending in total: $1,643,151.
The organization over time
Each line starts at 100 in 2017, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2017, 50 means half. The number beside each label in the key is where it ended. The shaded band is where the middle 50% of its peers' revenue would sit, given their growth.
Balance sheet
Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2019 to 2020, from $1.0M to $1.7M (+62%).
How it's funded, over time
Each bar is one year's revenue split into where it came from, and every bar is the same height — these are shares, not amounts, so a year that raised twice as much looks the same size. Hover a bar for the split.
Government-grant reliance: 2021 7%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
99% of TAXPAYERS FOR COMMON SENSE’s revenue is contributions — more reliant on donations than three-quarters of its peers (88% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 4 of the last 8 reported years ran a deficit.
reserve
Leadership and staff
The officers, directors, trustees and key employees listed on each return. Joined and no longer listed compare each filing with the year before, matching people by surname and first initial; a year after a gap, or a roster under three people, has no comparison.
Board chair
Mark Smith
Board chair
As listed on its FY2024 Form 990.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 14 funders to 18 funders, grant income rose $1.1M → $1.7M.
10 of 49 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 6% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.
From the IRS filings of TAXPAYERS FOR COMMON SENSE’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 49 funders by total. Association, not causation. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How concentrated its funding is
TAXPAYERS FOR COMMON SENSE has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 20% of grant income, and it takes 6 funders to reach half.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 6 funders to its left
45% of the income these shares are computed over arrives through pass-through sponsors or from payers whose filings do not say what kind of payment it is. Concentration is still measured over all of it, because the money is real; what it does not support is a claim about how many institutions have chosen to fund TAXPAYERS FOR COMMON SENSE.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 27% · 2018 22% · 2019 15% · 2020 14% · 2021 26% · 2022 23% · 2023 22% — diversifying over time.
“Effective funders” = inverse Herfindahl index (1 / Σ shareᵢ²) — the number of equal-sized funders that would give the same concentration. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How long its funders stay
42% of TAXPAYERS FOR COMMON SENSE's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 71% give in more than one year at all.
Share of funders still giving k years after their first recorded grant, pooled across every acquisition cohort. A funder counts as retained in a year only if it made a grant that year. Measured to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving — a funder cannot be counted as lapsed in a year most filers have not reached.
Where its funders are
TAXPAYERS FOR COMMON SENSE draws 96% of its grant income from funders outside Washington, D.C., across 12 states in all.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $712k arriving through sponsors registered in 9 states is excluded from the map and the split above: a sponsor holds money on a donor’s behalf, so its registered address would place those dollars somewhere no donor need ever have been. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
Against its field
TAXPAYERS FOR COMMON SENSE is better cushioned than half of the 1,003 public benefit nonprofits its size.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 1,003 public benefit nonprofits $1M–$10M, FY2024
Organizations like TAXPAYERS FOR COMMON SENSE
Organizations whose mission and program text most resemble this one, by semantic similarity over every organization in the US filings — the closest peers, and often the clearest route to shared or prospective funders.
In Washington, D.C.
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
84% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
83%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 1 state
Part of a family of 1 related entity
- Taxpayers for Common Sense Action · exempt
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for TAXPAYERS FOR COMMON SENSE: IRS status (Business Master File, Publication 78, auto-revocation), the OFAC sanctions lists, the Internal Revenue Bulletin, and California registration, with the Rev. Proc. 2018-32 §8.01 reliance elements stated element by element. Generated from the current files at the moment you download it.
Screens are triage, not determinations; a source that cannot be read reports not screened, never clear. Screen this nonprofit · How the screen works · on the API as GET /api/screening/{ein}?format=pdf
Questions and answers
- Who funds TAXPAYERS FOR COMMON SENSE?
- TAXPAYERS FOR COMMON SENSE (Washington, D.C.) receives grants from 49 organizations whose IRS filings report $12,541,172 to it, the largest being RESOURCES LEGACY FUND ($2,535,334). 35 of them have funded it in more than one year.
- How many funders does TAXPAYERS FOR COMMON SENSE have?
- IRS filings report 49 organizations giving $12,541,172 in grants to TAXPAYERS FOR COMMON SENSE, 35 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of TAXPAYERS FOR COMMON SENSE?
- RESOURCES LEGACY FUND is the largest funder on record, with $2,535,334 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like TAXPAYERS FOR COMMON SENSE find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in Washington, D.C.. The funding by cause and by state pages list the largest funders for a given area and how to approach them.
Play a game about who funds Taxpayers for Common Sense →
These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2024 (financials across 2017–2024), and the filings of 49 funders that report grants to it. “On record” means captured in the filings we have parsed — a funder that does not e-file, or whose grant detail is not itemized, will not appear. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind. Trends on this page end at FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving; later years are shown and marked, and move no figure. Data on this page was exported October 14, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing