Growth of the Movement.
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The tremendous growth of the :ovement in its present-day form
ay perhaps be ascribed to two main causes: the fairness and honesty
of the societies both as traders and employers, and the distribution
of dividends to consumers. The societies sell at market price, and
after paying normal expenses and a fixed rate of interest on share
capital, the remainder of the profit is distributed half-yearly to
the consumers as a dividend, proportionate to the amount of his or
her purchases. A consumer of small means, who could otherwise not
afford to put anything aside, will by this arrangement find himself
in possession of a sun every six months which he can either spend or
allow to accumulate up to the limit of £200. The capital held by
the retail societies amounts to £128,000,000, and of this vast sum
sixty per cent is believed to represent accumulated dividend.
The present membership of the co-operative societies in
Britain is well over 8,000,000 and their retail sales annually exceed
One-third of all wheat imported into the country is
milled by them, and they bake one-fifth of all the bread consumed
in Britain.
£250,000,000.
It is not only as retailers that the societies flourish; while
keeping the ideal of a co-operative commonwealth as their aim, they
have entered the field of production, and the movement now acts as
wholesale merchants, bankers and manufacturers; it imports raw
materials, owns plantations, and runs its own ships.
They
True to the ideals of Robert Owen, the societies offer their
members food for mind and spirit as well as for their bodies.
have been largely instrumental in bridging the gap between the
workers and the universities, and they spend £300,000 a year on
various forms of education, scholarships, study groups, etc.
They
have holiday clubs, rmusical and literary clubs, men's and women's
guilds, and they were among the first bodies in Britain to provide
free libraries.
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