JW.com discussion board consensus (if there is one) may be that an evil, greedy corporation policy is in place. My personal impression is that many in authority are true believers, much as we once were. Fiscal responsibility is connected to "furthering Kingdom interests" in their collective minds. If the GB mindset were purely fund generation, I think the "friends" would gladly give even more if asked to do so.
You had me laughing to hard to think with your comment about the possibility of a JW.com consensus. Not much chance of that, huh? ha, ha
I didn’t see a greedy corporate policy either. Numerical growth in numbers was the big ticket, monetary stuff always played a distant second fiddle – it was only rarely mentioned in any CO meeting I ever sat in on. And then, only in the context of the donation vs. literature outlay. Which by the way, is something the society looks at, even with the new “free give-away” policy in place.
They did feel that the money was Jehovah’s, and were accordingly frugal. But as with all things, the times they are a changin’. In my area, several scams have stared to come to light. Cash conversions of donations by overseers to avoid personal income taxes, phony “loan” paybacks on hall construction, kickbacks for assembly hall use, etc, etc.
But when all is said and done, I go back to Ray Franz’s comment – that as a GB member, he only heard the mention of total assets once! It just wasn’t talked about. The GB was to busy figuring out if masturbation should still be a burn in hell sin to venture into such mundane things as money. I believe the thought was, and still is – Jehovah will provide. And tax free to boot!
As a “true believer” I gave freely. Putting a c-note in the box kept me high for a week.
Thanks for the explanation TMS.
And Farkel, I wasn’t trying to hijack your thread. We only got a little off topic.
