[Avodah] School Tuition + Fundraising

[Stuart Feldhamer]

REMT:

"The "scrip" obligation is a true zeh nehene v'zeh lo chaseir: the parent is
obligated to purchase a certain amount of scrip (actually, supermarket gift
certificates) which can be used at full face value; the school purchases
them at a 5% discount.  Some parents prefer to pay the school its 5% profit
rather than purchase the scrip. "

I don't want to comment on the rest of the post, some of which I agree with
and some of which I don't, but this bears further examination. You say that
zeh nehene v'zeh lo chaseir. If I'm interpreting you correctly, you think
that essentially, the store is giving the school a charitable donation
(which no doubt they are taking a deduction for). The parents are paying for
what they would have paid for anyway, and the reason why it's good for the
school is that the stores, out of the goodness of their hearts, are giving
the school a 5% discount on the certificates.

However, this only works if the parents are actually planning on shopping at
the stores regardless. Maybe the parents had no interest in shopping at
those stores, and now they're essentially being forced to do so. Why would
they not want to shop there? Hypothetically speaking, maybe their prices are
on average 10% higher than the large supermarkets that don't accepts the
scrips. If that's the case, then the stores' motivations make a lot of
sense. They win, the school wins, and the parents lose out.

Of course, the parents can just decide to pay the school the 5% profit, and
some no doubt do this not out of the goodness of their hearts, because they
say, "why should we and the school both profit (zeh nehene v'zeh lo
chaseir), I want only the school to profit", but because it isn't worth it
to them economically. In effect what you've done is set another economic
obligation on them, and I don't see why this should be in any way separate
from the tuition burden.

Stuart

 

 

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