They're paid in large part to come up with minor variants on, and argue persuasively for and against, existing beliefs and practices that other philosophers strongly disagree about. The kinds of arguments, and to some extent the kinds of views, are determined to a significant extent by conventions about what it means to be a 'philosopher'. E.g., one's immediate goal is to try to persuade and earn the respect of dialectical opponents and near-allies, not to reliably answer questions like 'If my life were on the line, and I really had to come up with the right answer and not just an Interesting and Intuitively Appealing reef of arguments, how confident would I actually be that teleportation is death, is determinately death, and that that's the end of the story?'

If I could change just two small things about philosophers, it would probably be to (1) make them stop thinking of themselves (and being thought of by others) as a cohesive lump called 'Philosophy', and (2) make them think of their questions as serious, life-or-death disputes, not as highly refined intellectual recreation or collaborative play.

Relatedly, how are they funded? I'm assuming the large majority of professional philosophers are academics, but that still leaves it open. Is it primarily from tuition / university general funds, from endowed faculty positions, from government grants, from private grants or something else entirely?