[Avodah] early bird specials and ribbis

[David Riceman]

I find that I'm getting a bit confused by this discussion, so I'd like to 
start by putting the facts in order.  Let me start by citing three 
halachoth:

(i) YD 173:7 : "If a person purchases something worth 12 for 10 because he 
pays in advance: if they are in the possession of the seller but he lacks 
access until his son comes or until he finds the key it is permitted; if 
they are not in his possession it is prohibited ....  Rama: ... this applies 
only if it's unexpressed, but if he explicitly says "If you pay me now I'll 
charge 10 and if you pay me later I'll charge 12" it's prohibited.  This 
applies only to something with a fixed price, but if the value is unfixed it 
is permitted."

(ii) YD 176:6 :"A person may overcharge for rent of land.  How? If he rented 
him a courtyard and, before (the non-owner) occupied it he (the owner) said: 
"if you pay me now I'll charge you ten selah's a year, and if not I'll 
charge one selah a month", that is permitted, and it is also permitted when 
hiring a person.

(iii) YD 176:8 :"If someone hires a worker in the winter to work for him in 
the summer at a dinar a day and pays him early but the normal summer salary 
is a selah a day (4 dinrim) it is prohibited; but if he says work for me 
from now until that day for a dinar a day it is permitted since, because 
he's already started working it doesn't appear as though he's getting a 
discount for early payment."

<RZS>
> Because there is no prohibition on discounts for paying early.  The
> prohibition is only on surcharges for paying late.

This is in general false.  See halacha (i) above.  What I originally thought 
RZS meant was that this is ribbis d'rabbanan instead of ribbis d'orayysa. 
That seems to be the consensus of the poskim, but see Rashbam BB 87a s.v. 
"v'tisbra", who holds that it's d'orayysa when the price is fixed.

I misunderstood RZS.  He meant that it's mutar in the context of hiring (see 
halacha (iii) above).  The problem here is that it's mutar only if the 
employee is currently employed.  Why is that? The gemara (BB 87a) explains 
"zilzulai bischirus mi asrei?", which the Rashbam explains to mean that 
wages are not fixed, and workers are eager to have jobs at any price, so 
people don't treat it as a discount if someone agrees to a long term 
contract at lower than normal wages.  If, however, (continue the gemara and 
the Rashbam) payment precedes the initial employment, that does appear like 
a discount for early payment.

Now I'm not sure that the context of hiring is at all relevant here.  The 
distinctive feature of hiring (according to the gemara as understood by the 
Rashbam) is that there's no market price for labor.  In our case, however, 
the camp director has established the market price.  Nonetheless let's grant 
RZS his presumption.   He still has a large hurdle to overcome.  The halacha 
says "if he says work for me from now until that day for a dinar a day it is 
permitted" requiring continual work.  I'm going to cite RZS in extenso at 
the end of my post, since this part of the discussion took place off-line.

REMT had another suggestion:
<REMT>
<<I think that the question of early-bird discounts or late-
payment penalties are completely unrelated to ribbis, since there is
no factor of agar natar.  There is no loan, nor any charge nor
payment for use of another's funds.>>

<me>
See halachoth (i) and (iii) above.

<REMT>
     <<If an item has been sold at a given price, and the merchant
raises the price, he has certainly done no wrong.  Why should there
be a problem if he announces his intent to raise the price as of a
certain day?>>

<me>
But the item in this case does not yet exist and it hasn't been sold.  All 
of the purchasers are to receive the item at the same time.

Anyway, I remain puzzled by the psak this camp director received.

David Riceman

Here's the full text of the two offline posts of RZS:
<RZS>
<<Because at the time when the discount is available, payment is not due
yet.  If they want your money now, they need to appeal to your good will,
by offering a discount.  Everyone understands this.  So the fact that if
you don't pay until the due date it will cost you more, is not ribbis.
<RZS>
The only question is whether, as in the case with a wage advance to
a non-employee, it *looks* like a loan.  Would an observer mistakenly
think that this was a loan, completely unrelated to camp fees, and
the fact that they later allowed your kid to attend their camp was
repayment of the loan, and since the value of the camp attendance is
higher than the amount of the loan, they have paid you ribbis?  Put
like that, then answer is obvious: our observer would not jump to
such a conclusion, because 1) this practise is normal, and many other
parents are also paying at about the same time; 2) it's published in
the camp brochure; 3) your payment is accompanied by an application
form; possible 4) you may have written "camp fees" on the cheque,
where it says "purpose".  It's obvious that this is early payment for
camp fees, and not a gemilas chesed.
<RZS>
These factors make it unlike the case of wages, where it is unheard
of for a person to advance wages to someone who is not his employee,
but has agreed to become one at some future date.  This point is
illustrated by the fact that it *is* permitted to advance wages at
a discount to a *current* employee.  The nature of the transaction
is exactly the same.  The wages are not yet due, the work they are
paying for has not yet been performed, and the employee is not legally
obligated ever to perform it.  The only difference is the existence
of an employee-employer relationship, which explains to the observer
why money is being paid, and the fact that such transactions are
normal between employers and employees.>>
<RZS>
<<I should have added that if you sent at least one of your kids to the
same camp last year, then you have an ongoing relationship with the
camp, similar to the relationship that allows an employer to advance
wages to his employee without it looking like a loan.>>