A SURVEY OF TYPICAL COOPERATIVE STORES. 9 
too small to admit of the type of efficiency which can be secured only 
by having specialists charged with definite responsibility for certain 
divisions of the work. In most cases the manager himself is com- 
pelled to be a sort of business jack-of-all-trades. He is usually the 
responsible head of the store, and at the same time must act as buyer, 
head salesman, and bookkeeper. The man who combines efficiency in 
all of these kinds of work is rarely found, and is usually in business 
for himself. It is unusual for cooperative associations to be willing 
or able to pay the salary which will secure a man of this type. The 
salaries paid to the managers in the stores under consideration varied 
from $45 to $250 per month, making an average of $106 a month for 
the 42 stores for which figures were obtained. This fact alone is suffi- 
cient to explain why the majority of the stores were not more success- 
ful than the tables indicate. 
From the tabulated results of the questionnaire on page 4 it will 
be noted that only 7 stores report the employment of a man whose 
specialty is to act as sales manager, 4 report a special buyer, 10 a 
cashier, and 3 a stenographer. Thirty-one stores report the employ- 
ment of a bookkeeper. Careful inquiry, however, leads to the con- 
viction that all but a small proportion of these men are not capable 
of keeping a satisfactory set of accounting records. " It is the almost 
unanimous verdict of the store managers that greater attention must 
be given to the office end of the business, and that the auditing must 
be more efficiently performed. 
FINANCE. 
The points covered in the section of finance bring out the essential 
differences between the corporate and cooperative type of organiza- 
tion. In general, it may be said that with the cooperative type the 
shares of stock are smaller; that these shares do not determine the 
voting power of the member ; that paid-in capital stock usually bears 
a fixed rate of interest, while dividends are based upon the business 
and not upon holdings of stock; and that certain restrictions are 
placed upon stock transfer. The laws of most States require that a 
definite authorized capital be fixed in the charter or articles of asso- 
ciation, while in others the amount of stock need not be fixed. The 
latter practice corresponds with the cooperative laws of several 
European countries and aims to permit an indefinite growth in the 
membership and capital stock. 
For the 32 stores reporting the authorized capital, the average was 
$45,437, while 41 stores giving the amount of capital subscribed 
average $20,143, and 50 stores giving their paid-in capital average 
$16,627. The shares of stock, as given in Table I, vary from $1 to 
$100, with an average par value of $53. When questioned as to the 
47614°— Bull. 394—16 2 
