Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 4.djvu/811

 PROFIT-SHARING AND COOPERATION 79 1

In August, 1897, there were reported 152 of these societies that divided profits with the workmen.'

In support of the assertion that this movement has been a failure is the often published list of 224 alleged failures that had been registered between 1850 and 1880. This period would include the greater portion of both cooperative movements. This statement has gone almost unchallenged. But some recent authorities give the following explanation.' Of the 224 only twenty-four were copartnership workshops, giving a definite share of the profits to the laborers ; some two or three in addition had established some form of philanthropic fund ; forty-four had been consumers' workshops, where the labor was employed as under any other industry ; the remainder were joint-stock concerns, registered as industrial societies to escape expenses. When the Labor Association, which has for its object the promotion of labor copartnership, as this form of cooperation is called, was formed in 1883, there were only fifteen such societies in exist- ence. There have been many failures since that time, but the ratio of success to failure has been largely increased.

Out of the various cooperative interests grew the Cooperative Union, founded about 1871. It is now a loosely organized body of 1,500 or more cooperative societies, representatives of which meet annually in a cooperative congress. While merely a body for the exchange of ideas, it yet attempts to outline the policy of the general movement. At every one of these congresses the question of profit-sharing has come up for discussion, often quite acrimoniously. Year after year resolutions have been adopted indorsing the copartnership idea, but with no appreci- able effect. Miss Potter sums up the results of one of these resolutions and the subsequent investigation, called for by the congress of 1888 : " Out of the 1,503 societies only 488 thought fit to reply to the circular of the Central Board, the remainder

'Of this number, 61 are Irish societies, giving only fragmentary information. A more recent account given in Henry D. Lloyd's Labor Co-partnership increases this number to 228 for 1898, but without giving any further information concerning the profit-sharing feature.

•Anuerin Williams and Henry Vivian in \.\x Economic Review, \o\.W , p. 310.