[HCoop-Discuss] Financial situation

[Franklin Gordon Bynum]

On 04/30/2007 12:02:46 AM, j.c.hallgren at juno.com wrote:
> As far as I'm concerned, I AM looking at this as a business, and the  
> fact that it's a coop is a minor detail...

It doesn't matter how you look at it.  It's a co-op, not a business  
selling you a service. You can keep telling yourself that it's a  
business, but that won't change anything.

> I have no problem paying my share to get the EXACT same level of  
> service as when I first joined, which was more than adequate for my  
> needs

Let me beat this point to death: you did not contract with a company to  
give you a set service at a set price.  You joined a cooperative and in  
effect purchased a share of an organizaiton that is growing and needs  
capital contributions from its members.  This has always been clear.

> I'll use this analogy: Suppose I used a airport shuttle service that
> operated a van...it got me and my luggage to/from the airport...then
> the service became more popular and needed more capacity...so they
> bought a stretch bus...and then raised the price to double what it
> was...the bus doesn't get me there any better than the van, which was
> adequate for my needs...so because they got more users, instead of it
> costing me the same or less due to more users to carry the increased
> expenses, it costs me more...in that case, I'd have to find another
> service that still uses a van and charges that cheaper rate...

Your analogy misses the mark.  Let me help you out: imagine you are  
part of a vanpool where you commute in to the city center everyday.   
Four people all pitched in and bought an old eight-passenger van to do  
this.  They split monthly gas and maintenance costs.  People volunteer  
to drive.  They added more people, and got to eight passengers. Things  
went well enough, but the van was pretty cramped and was starting to  
have major mechanical problems.

So, the group decides they can either: a) quit vanpooling and all spend  
more to drive to work separately; b) Get rid of other people in the  
pool to make it less crowded, and spend a lot of money spread across  
only a few riders to fix up the van; c) temporarily put in more money  
to buy a brand new bus, and later recoup the costs when others join the  
vanpool.  The answer is so obvious that I won't waste anyone's time  
explaining it.

You're an owner, not a customer.  One of the many benefits of ownership  
is the ability to use user-written cgi scripts.  If you can't afford  
ownership or would otherwise rather not deal with ownership, that's  
your choice to make.