I don't agree with npm's ban, but open-source developers don't necessarily deserve payment for their work. I don't think there is much productive discussion to be had in the way of "how open-source consumers can contribute back". The reality is that the vast majority of consumers don't care about contributing back and never will; this is fundamental to the nature of open-source. Thus, if those developers want to get paid it's up to them to come up with a monetization strategy that works for them, whether that be the red-hat model, enterprise licensing, or even cli ads, let consumers decide if they can tolerate those terms.
