Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: Work or Pay Systems

[Tim Mensch (tim-coho-l]

Kay Argyle wrote:
> It seems to me that increasing assessments across the board to hire out
> community work creates a worse class division than the work-or-pay option
> does.  Instead of having no choice but to work off the assessment,
> low-income residents have no choice but - not to be residents. Or be overtly
> subsidized, if the community wants to.
>   
If the community values diversity, then yes, low-income residents would 
be subsidized, as I explained. Handle the money problem in the money 
domain, rather than adding layer upon layer of additional work (a 
work-or-pay system needs to be managed, after all) and conflict to a 
system that isn't getting enough volunteer labor and is already facing 
member burn-out because of conflict. Does it really make sense to add an 
entire layer of bureaucracy that everyone has to deal with to prevent 
people from having to ask for a reduced fee?

As an aside: Diversity in income means that some people do have more 
money than others. If you value that diversity, isn't it important to 
keep those with the higher incomes happy as well? Aren't there fewer of 
them, which would imply that it's even more important to keep them happy 
to make sure they stick around to help subsidize the folks with less 
disposable income? I would posit that it's a lot easier to find 
community members who have lower incomes to move into affordable units 
than it is to find folks with higher incomes to buy the units which have 
been marked up to subsidize the others. So, thinking strategically,  
shouldn't the community be designed to attract the money? And how many 
people with lots of money also have lots of free that they want to spend 
cleaning toilets?
> > I think the opposite conclusion--NO ONE has to work, nor do they need to
> > pay--is more humane: Spread the community maintenance costs evenly among
> > all members, instead of trying to penalize folks for not putting in
> > work. 
> > Tim Mensch
>
> If I understand this correctly, far from, "No one has to ... pay," it means
> everybody pays.
>   
Everybody pays means the burden is shared more equitably; it's the same 
reason that everyone pays for social security: If only the people who 
would likely need social security paid for it, it would cost much more. 
With proper planning, you can get economies of scale that reduce the 
overall cost, as opposed to trying to hire folks to do work piecemeal on 
an "as-needed" basis.
> Why is it "more humane" to require a set, highly regressive, payment of
> money, while allowing each resident to decide for themselves how much time,
> if any, they will offer to the community?  I've never understood this -
> however "American" it is (a country with no national service requirement). 
>   
First, I specifically suggested income-based progressive HOA dues, 
possibly not charging low-income members the abovementioned fee at all. 
Second, while I'm not proud of everything American at the moment, 
bashing America doesn't contribute to the discussion. Are you saying 
that it should be more important for me to use my time cleaning toilets 
than, say, volunteering to provide expert computer assistance to a 
non-profit? (Something I've done more than once) Or should I need to buy 
out work hours for the privilege of donating my expert skills? If I want 
to have enough time to get a reasonable amount of exercise in a week, 
should that cost me money? As someone who likes to save money, it 
bothers me to "waste" money (i.e., pay buyout dollars) instead of 
getting work done, and so I'm stuck either being annoyed by spending the 
money or using up my free time doing something that I hate.

Rob's community seems to have a reasonable compromise: You can get an 
HOA discount if you jump through the right hoops to document and submit 
your work hours.  I know it's functionally equivalent, but 
psychologically it makes a world of difference to me--in part because of 
the framing, where instead of having to pay what feels like a "penalty" 
for not working enough (and what frequently seems to be set at punitive 
levels rather than at actual costs), you need to seek out a discount if 
you need the extra money.
> The amount of discretionary money a person has is their income minus their
> fixed expenses. Incomes vary widely. The amount of discretionary time a
> person has is their total time minus their obligations. Yet everybody has
> the same 24 hours in the day. 
>   
On the face of it, yes. But with long commutes, longer work hours, and 
family commitments, where exactly is the time supposed to come from? If 
you enjoy work parties, then it can come from your recreational 
time--but I don't, so if I want to have any time to spend doing 
something fun, I have to pay extra for it? Why would I want to live 
under those conditions? Answer: I don't. I moved out of one community 
already as a result.
> However, we've already given people the choice not to work. Asking someone
> to pay for the privilege at least gives those who are willing to work the
> possibility of hiring out some of it, instead of doing their jobs and the
> other people's too.
>   
Your community culture includes an expectation that people do work. It's 
common--it's almost a tenet of cohousing. With that expectation--and 
that framing--you can make statements like "...doing their jobs and the 
other people's too."  But if there's no built-in expectation that people 
need to work, then the resentment you're expressing doesn't exist. There 
IS NO OTHER PEOPLE'S WORK. There's only work you want to do, or you 
don't. And the folks who can afford it contribute to what needs to be 
done. The folks who can't, don't. Much, much simpler. I've never met 
someone in a traditional condo who complained that other members weren't 
doing enough gardening, even if they liked to garden themselves.
> > The costs to handle all jobs that weren't being done under the
> > existing system in a previous community were estimated at
> > $6-$12/month/household. I would hope that any homeowner should be able
> > to afford an expense of that magnitude ...
>
> That had to have been an extremely high-functioning community.
>   
Not to hear them describe it at the time. :)
> We estimated this spring that it would take a special assessment of $25 per
> month (or preferably a lump sum of $300) per household to hire sufficient
> labor...
>
> ... If we'd had the full assessment, maybe we
> wouldn't be coming back to square one.
Not that this will help much to hear, nor will it help in your 
community, but if from square one the expectation was that the work 
would be hired out, then the $25/month would simply be a fact-of-life 
extra expense in your community, and folks would have needed to decide 
whether or not to move in based on whether they could afford HOA dues of 
that level--or if you ended up with a sliding scale, then low income 
folks would pay less or none of that amount, and higher-income folks 
would pay more.

In an existing community, it's almost impossible to change the 
expectations, however--because in part of built-up resentment from folks 
who don't want to pay so "someone else doesn't have to work," and 
because of the "We Want To Do Our Own Work!" attitude common in 
cohousing. The best "retrofit" you might be able to adopt is a 
pay-or-play system. But I would argue that just adding that $25/month 
permanently to your dues (with or without a progressive scale based on 
income) is not only the right thing to do, but far, far less hassle than 
the alternative. One way or the other, that work needs to be done, or 
the community could face a lawsuit based on the fact that the HOA isn't 
performing its required duties, and thereby hurting property values. 
Note that a "work requirement" of 5 hours/month/unit with a buyout of 
$5/hour would get you your $25/month--though as I mentioned, flipping it 
around, adding $25 to dues, and allowing people to do extra work to get 
a $25 discount, might be much easier to swallow.

A good investment might be to hire a facilitator like Tree Bressen to 
come and help your group determine how best it can climb out of the hole 
it's dug itself into. Tree in particular was able to help Pleasant Hill 
adopt a pay-or-play style system (over my and others' reasoned 
objections, but then again, they are getting more work done now, and 
have money to pay for even more work). And having a system that 
generates money and/or gets the work done, one way or another, is more 
important than what the system is. I just won't be buying one of those 
vacant units if pay-or-play is the result. :P

Good luck, in any case,

Tim

--
Tim Mensch

Currently at Wild Sage (Boulder, CO): http://www.wildsagecohousing.org

Moving out! Our unit is for sale! http://1635yellowpine.com