Posts by slimboyfat

192

Question for SBF

by Fisherman in

slimboyfat, it appears that wts is going, gone digital.

can you show your view what is wts next move after they are completely gone from kings county and settled in warwick?

- this thread is your if you want it..

slimboyfat

Why the uncertainty about timing of collapse?

Simply because we don't know how much money Watchtower has on hand. We do know they have a revenue problem and there is no apparent solution in sight. So on this trajectory they will run out of money at some point. How long this will take depends on how much money they have in reserve and how skilful they are at managing decline. These things are not easy to determine.

Of course there is also the possibility they will reverse the decline. It's just not easy to see how.

192

Question for SBF

by Fisherman in

slimboyfat, it appears that wts is going, gone digital.

can you show your view what is wts next move after they are completely gone from kings county and settled in warwick?

- this thread is your if you want it..

slimboyfat

Sounds plausible. But I wonder if he meant this year alone, or over a longer period. The financial information publicly available in the UK indicates they have a reasonable cushion of funds at the moment and income covers expenses. It also indicates a high level of spending recent years. It will be interesting to see how this develops in the next few years. Income in Britain from "literature production" (presumably sales of literature to other branches) has been declining rapidly. (Apparently this is how they count it - one branch pays another branch for literature) The United States, United Kingdom and Germany have all been mass exporters of Watchtower literature in the past. As this declines their surpluses may decline. It's all very complicated, but there is information out there that is worth investigating. There must be interested people with the skills to analyse these things.

It's worth bearing in mind that the US, UK, Germany and Brazil combined account for about a quarter of JW membership. If most other countries have a deficit that's not a great position to be in. You might even call it unsustainable.

114

JW Stumper Questions - List You Best Here

by pale.emperor in

hi guys.

sooner or later we're going to get a jw knocking on our door.

just like when we were jw's doing the knocking, it's good to have a question prepared to get them thinking about their own beliefs.

slimboyfat

I meant to say "not allow you to discuss".

Would be funny if the response was: "I'd rather not discuss that".

114

JW Stumper Questions - List You Best Here

by pale.emperor in

hi guys.

sooner or later we're going to get a jw knocking on our door.

just like when we were jw's doing the knocking, it's good to have a question prepared to get them thinking about their own beliefs.

slimboyfat

Are there any questions your religion does now allow you to discuss?

192

Question for SBF

by Fisherman in

slimboyfat, it appears that wts is going, gone digital.

can you show your view what is wts next move after they are completely gone from kings county and settled in warwick?

- this thread is your if you want it..

slimboyfat

I have addressed this point. You are making the same naive assumption Watchtower have made. They believed that when they stopped charging for the literature that the brothers would keep donating the same amount anyway. It turned out they were wrong, contributions fell and their output has shrunk as a result.

Actually the key quote from you above I thought was this one:

The org will simply find new ways to separate the sheep from their money as every other religion always has and will have an easier time than most since its a high control cult.

Which is exactly the point. JWs have defined themselves as a religion that does not tithe or pass collections. Historically they have made their money from selling literature, so they didn't need to. It's undeniable that other religions make their money in other ways - mainly by tithing, collections and charitable activity. The question is how is Watchtower going to make their money now that publishing has dried up. Simply saying "they'll find a way" is not an answer. What way? And how? So far there's no evidence they've found any way to replicate the income they once made from literature sales. The best solutions offered so far has been charges for digital content or a tithe on membership. Neither of which Watchtower have yet done, and it's questionable if it would work if they did.

192

Question for SBF

by Fisherman in

slimboyfat, it appears that wts is going, gone digital.

can you show your view what is wts next move after they are completely gone from kings county and settled in warwick?

- this thread is your if you want it..

slimboyfat

Whatever your definition of tithe, I think it implies more than simply appealing for donations with no sanction.

In some European countries churches have the legal right to tax their members, which is ollected along with general taxation. So far (as far as I know) JWs have not joined such programs, I don't know if that was on principle or because they would be rejected. Maybe they will try to be included in the scheme at some point.

In any case JWs are very low contributors from what I can tell. I am looking at local churches that generally collect £30, 000 to £200,000 a year. The local congregation of JWs less than £9000.

192

Question for SBF

by Fisherman in

slimboyfat, it appears that wts is going, gone digital.

can you show your view what is wts next move after they are completely gone from kings county and settled in warwick?

- this thread is your if you want it..

slimboyfat

Fisherman, as I understand it yes, publishers paid up front for the literature at the desk. I also recall something about pioneers or special pioneers getting a discount. I can't quite remember that far back in detail.

I find it interesting that in the UK Jehovah's Witnesses have around 130,000 active members who donated £15 million to the Watchtower Society in 2013. Whereas Mormons have around 70,000 active members who donated £30 million to their church. The situation is probably much more complicated than that. But the idea Mormons contribute something in the region of four times as much as JWs would not surprise me at all.

192

Question for SBF

by Fisherman in

slimboyfat, it appears that wts is going, gone digital.

can you show your view what is wts next move after they are completely gone from kings county and settled in warwick?

- this thread is your if you want it..

slimboyfat

I wonder if anyone knows or has a good estimate what monthly allowance bethelites got in the 1980s and an estimate how much it cost to house and feed them. My very rough guess is they could have done that for $5000 or less per bethelite per year. If there were around 5000 bethelites in the period that would mean a total cost of $25 million a year to house, feed and pay bethelites an allowance. That's probably an overestimate.

192

Question for SBF

by Fisherman in

slimboyfat, it appears that wts is going, gone digital.

can you show your view what is wts next move after they are completely gone from kings county and settled in warwick?

- this thread is your if you want it..

slimboyfat

If I understand the charts on this page correctly they indicate that the magazines cost less than 5 cents to produce at a time when the cover price was 25 cents. (That differs from the price quoted above but it's the figure Watters gives for 1979 - worth checking if possible) With a circulation of 10 million each of W & A that would mean a profit of $94 million a year just from magazines.

Books are more difficult to work out, both the unit cost and the sales totals.

But when you consider that each JW in this period would likely buy: a yearbook, a daily text book, a calendar, a couple of the new release books for the year, plus other items less regularly: Bibles, song books, tapes, videos, concordances, insight books, reference Bibles, large print editions and so on. Incomes from literature sales was clearly substantial. No wonder they had money to burn in the 1980s and into the 90s!

http://www.freeminds.org/history/presroom.htm

192

Question for SBF

by Fisherman in

slimboyfat, it appears that wts is going, gone digital.

can you show your view what is wts next move after they are completely gone from kings county and settled in warwick?

- this thread is your if you want it..

slimboyfat

I am trying to counter your claim that the revenue from the publications was their main and lucrative source of income. $50,000,000.00 a year is hardly the MAIN source of operating revenue for an organization as large as WATCHTOWER.

Some figures from Britain for the 1980s are available through the links shepherdless gave.

In 1985 it shows income at the British branch: £4,303,000 came from the sale of literature whereas the total from donations and legacies was £470,000. Clearly literature sales was their main source of income in this period. (Possibly more was donated to the IBSA, but nevertheless £4.3 million from literature and magazine sales is substantial for this period)

I find it strange that you say $50,000,000 was not much annual profit in the 1980s. Yet a billion dollars from the sale of property in 2016 is said to be a huge sum that will keep them going for years. I'd much rather an annual income of $50 million dollars (in 1980s money!) than a one off payment of $1 billion in today's money! Within a few years you'd be up on the deal.