2_old_2B_clever

The community actually saves a ton of money, to pay for equipment and to act as insurance.

The old do depend on the young, about 20 some years ago, it was getting to be a real issue that the population was really aging out of the hard physical labor that running a farm and factories require. There was a push to recruit a lot more youths. Which sort of changed the culture of the commune in a lot of ways (lots more parties/load music/ drug use/drinking) a lot of the older members didn't like so quite a few left.

The elderly are taken care of totally.

Some communities do have the community saving model and when a member leaves they get a cut, but TO doesn't. Which is part of the reason I didn't stay a long time, it felt like my labour was going towards something I couldn't take with me.

As an ex-member I can say you actually have a pretty good grasp on a lot of the dynamics. One thing you are missing however is staying in a counter-cultural place for a long time you can really build a web of like-minded individuals and have a lot of opportunities to move around in that world. You do have to stay in that world, however, so it does sort of trap some of them into staying and it does result in some rather grumpy older long term members staying around if the culture does not change to their liking.

As far as jobs go, all jobs count equally towards your weekly total, some require a lot more skill and knowledge to perform well and safely. We aren't going to let a visitor work on the tree felling crew or drive the dump truck or work with the cows or bees.

An interesting corollary effect is, due to healthy food, exercise, and social connections. TO's older members tend to live longer than their relatives. Pretty frequently one of them will get a sizable inheritance and just pull up stakes and head out to Costa Rica, in a very fast, "see you later bitches!" manner.

I have a librarian friend who worked at a Christian School in the mid-west her policy was the person who wanted to ban a book (Harry Potter?) had to read the whole book and write why they thought it should be banned.

She never had to ban a book, no one wanted to go to the effort.

If someone doesn't work they wouldn't be accpeted.

People pick their own jobs which really increases the buy in towards wanting to do them.

Community pressure is a powerful thing. I cooked there and at the end of meals you can either see empty trays or piles of uneaten food and hear complaints. You feel bad if you are serving all your friends shitty food.

The community falls under a special tax code (the same one monasteries do) that everyone is collectively taxed, and the profit from the businesses is equally shared out to members and taxed.