Montana Cooperatives Support Larger Economy and Population.

• Author: Barkey, Patrick M.

Cooperatives in Montana are so ubiquitous that their unique importance to the economies of the communities where they are located can be overlooked. A recent study by the Bureau of Business and Economic Research fills the information gap with an analysis of their economic contributions as well as providing details about what they do, who they serve and how their activities underpin prosperity in many parts of the state.

Using operating and financial data gathered from 126 cooperative businesses located in every corner of the state, researchers constructed a measure of co-ops' ultimate economic contribution. In short, agricultural co-ops result in more jobs, more income, more sales, and more people and families than would exist in their absence. Their impact is particularly significant to the economic fabric of rural eastern Montana.

The economic models used in the study relied on information about co-ops' actual employment, compensation, revenue and vendor spending from 2021. The Montana Cooperative Development Center, which sponsored the study, helped the bureau gather data for its analysis.

The study did not take into account the significant benefits of the products and services cooperatives provide Montana households and businesses, including farms and ranches. In many rural communities the cooperative is the only viable provider of agricultural services and supplies. The value that Montanans receive from cooperatives doubtless far exceeds the value paid for what they produce.

Taken as a whole, the 126 businesses that provided information to this study employed 4,480 people, paid wages and benefits of $288.3 million and realized revenue of $1.78 billion in 2021.

What was considered in the study is how the livelihoods of the workers, families, businesses and even local governments are impacted by the economic activities of cooperative businesses.

What Montana Cooperatives Do

Cooperatives are user-owned or user-controlled businesses that are formed and operated to create benefits for their members.

From their origins in crafts and skilled trades in Europe in the 19th century, cooperatives have expanded both geographically and across a wide spectrum of economic activity. Their growth in the United States was especially fast in the last half of the 1800s, partly as a reaction to the growth of monopolies and greater industrial concentration that occurred in that era.

One of the most important contributions of this study is the development of...