A working comparison of the realistic legal homes for a mission-driven technology organisation in the United States: a 501(c)(3) public charity, a 501(c)(6) business/trade league, and an ordinary for-profit company (LLC, C-corp, or benefit corporation) — plus what changes depending on which state you incorporate in.
Written for founders who need to make one decision once, and who will be living with the filings, the tax posture and the governance constraints for years.
Not legal or tax advice. This is a research summary to make you a better client of a lawyer, not a substitute for one. Rules change; verify anything load-bearing against the primary sources in docs/sources.md before you file.
Read it as a site: https://ethical-tech-colab.github.io/us-entity-structure-guide/
| If you want to know… | Read |
|---|---|
| What each entity type actually is, and what it costs you | docs/entity-types.md |
| Pros and cons side by side | docs/comparison.md |
| Which state to incorporate in | docs/states.md |
| A decision path from "what are we doing" to "file this" | docs/decision-guide.md |
| Filing fees, forms, deadlines | docs/costs-and-filings.md |
| Hybrid structures (c3 + c6, c3 + LLC, fiscal sponsorship) | docs/hybrids.md |
| Primary sources | docs/sources.md |
If your work is research, education, or public benefit and you want tax-deductible donations and foundation grants, you want a 501(c)(3) — and you accept an absolute ban on political campaign activity, a cap on lobbying, a public Form 990, and the fact that nobody owns the assets. If your work serves a common business interest of an industry or membership — standards, advocacy, convening — a 501(c)(6) buys you unlimited lobbying and looser purpose constraints at the price of non-deductible dues and no foundation grants. If you need equity, speed, and the ability to keep the upside, form a for-profit; you can still be mission-locked through a benefit corporation or contract. Most serious organisations end up with two entities, not one.
- Federal tax law is national; state law is not. Every state number here is point-in-time and needs re-checking at filing.
- "Where to incorporate" and "where to register to do business" are different questions, and the second one is the expensive one. See docs/states.md.
- Nothing here covers 501(c)(4) social welfare orgs in depth, private foundations, or non-US structures.
Corrections welcome, especially state-level fee and filing changes. Please cite a primary source (state SoS, AG charities bureau, or IRS) in the PR.
CC BY 4.0 — Ethical Tech CoLab.