Cooperatives: Working together offers advantages in hard times

The ongoing mortgage crisis and last week's bailout -- or rescue or whatever one wants to call it -- have forced many of us the take a quick course in economics.

While much of the crisis can be traced to greed and deception, it's unfortunate that too many of us will let the misdeeds of a few color our view of the legitimate role profit plays in our system.

While that role rings true even in mid-America, there's another system that returns that profit to its customers.

Celebrating October as National Co-op Month, the Nebraska Cooperative Council points out that cooperative businesses generate hundreds of thousands of jobs and billions in income for their communities while also supporting local causes ranging from education to the environment.

According to more than 20 pages of case studies put together by the National Co-op Month Planning Committee, there are more than 21,000 U.S. cooperatives in a wide variety of industries, and serving 120 million members, more than a third of all Americans.

Cooperatives employ more than 600,000 people with aggregate payrolls of more than $15.5 billion annually and generate revenue in excess of $273 billion. The top 100 cooperatives had total revenues of more than $150 billion in 2006.

Nebraskans should be especially conscious of cooperatives -- many of us are among the 2.8 million members of 3,000 agricultural cooperates in the United States. They market approximately a third of the U.S. farm products and employ 300,000 people with a payroll of $8 billion.

Many of us are also served by credit unions -- nationally there are about 8,500 credit unions with more than 90 million members and $750 billion in assets.

And, as the state with purely publicly-owned electric utilities in the United States, Nebraska is in good company. Nationwide, nearly 1,000 cooperatives own and maintain nearly half of the electric distribution lines in the United States. Their lines cover three-fourths of the U.S. land mass and provide electricity to 39 million Americans.

But there are other co-ops as well:

* Telecommunications -- some 260 cooperatives provide service to 1.9 million people.

* Housing -- approximately 7,500 cooperatives provide homes for $1.2 million families or 3 million people.

* Grocery -- more than 350 retail and wholesale cooperatives have annual revenues of $33.5 billion. Retail food cooperatives alone have 500,000 members.

* Purchasing -- some 300 cooperatives serve 50,000 independent small businesses.

And, people feel connected to their local co-ops; According to a 2003 survey by the National Cooperative Business Association and the Consumer Federation of America found that two-thirds of consumers believe co-ops are more trustworthy, more ethically governed and provide value, quality, price and commitment.

As the Nebraska Cooperative Council puts it, "Nebraska's farmer-owned cooperatives provide shining examples of the commitment to members. With membership of more than 67,000 patrons, these agricultural cooperatives provide services in nearly 400 communities across the state. With sales of $4.36 billion annually, these cooperatives have invested more than $97 million in equipment and facilities in rural Nebraska this past year. In addition, these cooperatives have returned 444 million in patronage to their members."

With increasing concern over the national economy, now is a good time to remember the benefits cooperatives offer.