--- title: the people keeping nature alive should make a lot of money canonical_url: https://ensurance.app/guide/the-people-keeping-nature-alive-should-make-a-lot-of-money markdown_url: https://ensurance.app/guide/the-people-keeping-nature-alive-should-make-a-lot-of-money.md subtitle: passion is not a discount category: nature-finance --- # the people keeping nature alive should make a lot of money *passion is not a discount* Picture a burn boss on a ridge in October, an hour before ignition. She has read the fuel moisture, the wind and the slope. Below her are a few thousand homes, a reservoir and the only road out. If she gets it right, nothing happens, and nobody downstream ever learns her name. That is skilled, high-consequence work. So is riding range to keep cattle and wolves apart, reading a wetland's water table through a dry year, or marking which trees a forest can lose and which it cannot. Some of that skill is taught in universities. A great deal of it is carried by families and nations who have tended the same ground for generations. The people who do this work should be among the highest-paid and wealthiest people in the world. A living wage is the floor. The goal is wealth. I believe the same about teachers and about social and cultural practitioners; this essay is about the people keeping nature alive. :::johnson **passion is not a discount.** The people keeping forests, wetlands and watersheds alive should be among the best paid in the economy. That takes enterprises that price skilled care into what they sell, keep people on payroll for decades, and share ownership with the ones doing the work. ::: ## why high paying conservation jobs are rare Search for **high paying conservation jobs** and notice how rarely the field work itself appears. I do not think that is because the work is worth little. I think it is because so little of it is ever billed to anyone. The economy already knows how to pay for protecting value. People who price risk, structure deals or manage portfolios are paid well because the assets they handle are large and their mistakes are expensive. Nobody calls it greed when a reinsurance analyst buys a house. Apply the same test to a watershed. A city's drinking water, a valley's flood protection and a county's ability to get insured can all depend on it. The asset is enormous and mistakes are expensive. Yet in my experience the person keeping it functional is too often a seasonal hire, funded one grant cycle at a time, and expected to count the view as part of the pay. We pay well to move money. We underpay to keep its source alive. That is a pricing error, and pricing errors can be fixed. ## "won't high pay come out of the conservation budget?" It will, if the only money is a fixed grant. Then every dollar of salary is a dollar that never reaches the ground, and decent people hold their own pay down out of loyalty to the place. A whole profession has been built on that sacrifice. The answer is a different kind of money: revenue. Someone who depends on the place pays for its care as a service. A water provider needs clean water coming off the forest. An insurer carries the fire risk. The price they pay should carry senior people at senior rates, the way an engineering firm's price does. No good engineer apologizes for a billing rate. Revenue that recurs makes payroll that lasts: year-round positions, benefits, paid training, and a career that goes on after the body can no longer run a chainsaw all day. Grants and public budgets still start work and pay for what no customer will, and a nonprofit can pay very well. But a payroll that has to last thirty years needs someone paying for thirty years. ## "isn't profit the problem?" Profit earned by wearing a place down is the problem. Profit earned by keeping it alive is the point, as long as it reaches the crew. A profitable company can pay its field staff badly, and a green mission changes nothing about that arithmetic. High pay has to be designed in, through three separate routes. | route | what it does | where it is decided | |---|---|---| | **price** | Carries skilled care at senior rates | The customer contract, before any investor return is calculated | | **payroll** | Turns revenue into steady income | Year-round roles, benefits, training, reserves for bad seasons | | **ownership** | Turns a good career into wealth | Employee ownership, profit share or equity for people in the field, where lawful and suitable | The third row is the one conservation rarely reaches. A salary pays for this year. Wealth comes from owning part of something that grows. A forester with a stake in the firm that keeps a forest standing, or a range rider with equity in the enterprise she rides for, is building what any founder builds. If the business model only works because committed people accept very little, the model is broken. Redesign it. ## what ensurance does, and what it does not promise A forest, a wetland or a watershed exists and sustains life whether or not anyone buys anything. [*Ensurance*](/?from=guide) is a way to fund its protection and care. The funding has two jobs that go together: secure the place, and pay for the work that keeps it. The care should not wait for a purchase to close; it should be priced and paid as it is done. One route to people is already built. The first sale of a [certificate](/specific?from=guide) can pay a named account, and that account can be a split that includes a crew. The salaries, profit shares and ownership stakes described above are choices an enterprise makes. Ensurance does not grant them. No salary is promised here, buying a coin is not paying a steward, and no payout is guaranteed. The ambition is large. The claim is narrow. ## frequently asked questions ### are there high paying conservation jobs? Some are, mostly where someone is billed for the work. In my experience, grant-funded field stewardship rarely pays like the assets it protects. Ask any employer where its revenue comes from and whether it recurs. ### can you get rich protecting nature? It should be possible, and it is not common yet. Salary alone rarely builds wealth in any profession. It takes an enterprise with paying customers and an ownership stake for the people doing the work. ### what is universal BASIN income? Our name for income by account. In ensurance, a place, a purpose or a person can have a named account, and proceeds from an instrument that names it land there. Paying certificate holders automatically, pro rata, is designed but not live. It is not a fixed, unconditional or guaranteed payment. ## start with the route that fits your work If you steward a place, run a nature enterprise or bring capital to one, read [how to make money with ensurance](/guide/how-to-make-money-with-ensurance?from=guide). It lays out the ways this work can pay. Then build the one that makes the burn boss rich. ## the series Both: making money by keeping nature alive. A seven-part reading sequence, bringing new essays together with existing Guide posts. 1. [both](/guide/both?from=guide) — the case for holding both ambitions 2. [the private ten percent](/guide/the-private-ten-percent?from=guide) — the private share of nature finance 3. [the 30:1 gap: why nature finance is failing (and how to fix it)](/guide/the-30-to-1-gap-why-nature-finance-is-failing?from=guide) — the direction of finance 4. [capital doesn't invest for nature. it invests.](/guide/capital-doesnt-invest-for-nature?from=guide) — the financial reason to participate 5. **the people keeping nature alive should make a lot of money** — prosperity for the people doing the work *(you are here)* 6. [how to make money with ensurance](/guide/how-to-make-money-with-ensurance?from=guide) — the ways the work can pay 7. [both has to survive the transaction](/guide/both-has-to-survive-the-transaction?from=guide) — a practical test for the business model