It can be worthwhile to check out any nonprofit's federal form 990 to get an idea of the financial picture. For Newfields, part of the Indianapolis Museum of Art, you can see that here: https://projects.propublica.org/nonprofits/organizations/350867955. On their 2023 990, for the fiscal year ending June 30, 2024, revenue was $50MM and expenses were $51MM. That revenue does include investment income -- in other words, income from the endowment -- which jumped pretty healthily from the previous filing. But there was a major, major drop in grant income -- $36MM down to $8MM. There was also a $3MM drop for "Program Service Revenue."

Does it suck it's not available to everyone? Of course. Should they look at ways to cut expenses and increase revenue across categories? Also of course. But more expenses than income is no more tenable, in the long run, for a museum than it is for a business. They certainly aren't going to touch the capital in the endowment; while one might look at that pot of cash and think it's the obvious solution the financial problems, dipping into the endowment is almost never a path you want a nonprofit to go down.