Market Farming

["GlobalCirclenet" <webmaster AT globalcircle.net>]

Those "failures"  referred to can't be pinned on any inherent flaw in the
coop concept. ALL types of business run into problems; it's human nature.
Think ENRON. Think GLOBAL CROSSING, HALLIBURTON, & STOCK PRICES.  Also,
many kinds of coops have to function under all kinds of regulatory burdens
and sometimes in competition with corporations that have just about every
subsidy and loophole imaginable written into the law to favor them.
Corporations plow investors money into grabbing more market share, and
that's probably where you see coops having trouble with enough
capitalization to compete with them. The insurance racket is hardly a fair
test for co-ops.  It's not a level playing field. As for farm coops "going
 bankrupt", I'd have to see some hard figures before I'd believe it's even
worth a mention.  All that sounds like badmouthing coops to me. It sounds
like more corporate propaganda.

paul & barb - on the continental divide
http://globalcircle.net

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On 10/16/2002 at 6:41 PM Rick Williams wrote:

>Although one might think that this is true, what has unfolded over the
last
>150 years or so has not been so supportive of coops. The coop concept
seems
>to fail as you get larger and larger and lose the purpose of serving the
>owners. Also, the coop model makes it difficult to capitalize the business
>and that is why so many coops have either failed or have de-mutualized and
>gone to stock owned companies. We see that with insurance companies in
>particular. With farm coops it is tragic because they basically go
bankrupt
>and the owners never get their money back which they have put in, often
for
>decades.
>