Savings association

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Sign of the Discount-Spar-Verein Niedersedlitz and surroundings - Dresden
"Einigkeit-Bierden" cash book from 1936

Sparvereine , also known as savings clubs , are part of the club culture in the German-speaking environment and emerged in the mid-19th century. In addition to the concern of saving together, socializing also played a role. Today (as of 2016) savings associations are also gaining ground as microfinance institutions in West and Central Africa and in parts of Southeast Asia.

Savings associations also played a role as a preliminary organization in the establishment of a (mostly) cooperative banking institution such as construction, production and trade cooperatives. The term can be found several times as part of the name of the corresponding institutes.

Development in Germany

The first communities of small savers were recorded in Germany as early as 1847. The idea of ​​community saving spread in northern Germany, where it was first picked up as "Christmas saving". The first savings clubs in Hamburg , operated by seafarers and dock workers from 1878, also served to provide mutual support in emergencies. Relevant statutes called for the innocent character of the new members, an initial deposit and monthly payments. In 1845, the Berlin General State Treasurer and honorary member of the Poor's Commission, Gottlieb Samuel Liedke, proposed using so-called special-purpose savings associations to enable those in need to purchase inexpensive household items and groceries in large quantities on a joint account. With this concept, the savings associations (also called Liedkesche associations) functioned as purchasing cooperatives at the same time. However, the separation of the savings association and the consumer cooperative has prevailed. A large number of foundations took place in the Saxon area as early as 1879, in addition to Leipzig and Chemnitz, especially in the industrial villages of the Ore Mountains. In Saxony the liability requirements were less strict. As early as 1890 there were complaints about the pleasure and cleaning addiction of the lower classes . In the same way, small and medium-sized businesses and retailers protested against the consumer associations during the German Empire.

Differentiation from the cooperative banks and consumer companies

In the German-speaking countries, in parallel with the Sparkassen and Raiffeisenkassen, a very early and important microfinance offer arose beyond the large financial institutions. Friedrich Wilhelm Raiffeisen  (1818–1888) had initiated agricultural purchasing cooperatives to buy production goods such as seeds and fertilizers as well as related financial services at low cost. The  cooperative-based savings and consumer associations founded by Hermann Schulze-Delitzsch (1808–1883) worked in a more urban and communal environment, but also appealed to less wealthy classes. From the middle of the 20th century in Germany they merged with the Raiffeisen banks.

Savings associations enabled savings to be made below the cooperative savings banks. In the savings association, fees and expenses for a separate account or savings book were shared. At the same time, the savings association was a sociable institution. The joint contributions were often paid out at a party or event, and occasionally they were used to finance a joint trip or event through the savings association, whether registered or not. There are also savings associations, in addition to gymnastics and singing associations, also in the context of the Pan-German movement in the empire that emerged at the end of the 19th century .

Role in cooperative society

Some savings associations, some of which were also organized through the companies, associations or (for example, in the case of railways and post offices) through the associated regional administration of the employer, were also forerunners of relevant banking institutes in the employee sector, similar developments can also be found among craftsmen, civil servants and farmers. Conversely, savings associations also emerged after established savings banks - as was investigated using the example of Amberger Sparkasse, which was founded in 1824. It was not seen as a competitor. Amberg also was to 1880 private savings club , a private-saving society and the savings club gun factory workers and the savings club Baumann'schen Blechwaarenfabrik of workers of Gebr. Was founded. The names already indicate a certain social differentiation.

After the repeal of the socialist laws and the easing of liability requirements around 1890, the establishment of cooperatives in general and especially for employees was made easier. In the case of building cooperatives (some of which still exist today), the origin of the savings association can still be found in the name, for example at Gemeinnützige eG Bau- und Sparverein Geislingen, as well as at the initially socialist-oriented Hamburg consumer, building and savings association "Production" , founded in 1899 among other things ran its own coffee roastery.

While the savings association in Dresden already had Jewish members before 1860, other institutes or associations that were already organized as cooperatives excluded Jews. The banker Werner Kleemann, (among other things on the board of the Dresdner Bank ) campaigned massively for a Jewish cooperative system in the 1920s. In 1932 the loan and savings association Esra was founded as the third Jewish credit union in Berlin for the particularly disadvantaged East Jews in Berlin.

Savings cabinets

Savings cabinet in a school savings bank from the Economic Museum in Ravensburg

In the first third of the 20th century came saving boxes (also Community Saving box, saving box or saving box , in Austria also Sparverein box on) that made a deposit of savings even without the presence of a cashier. Such models made of steel, or more rarely made of wood, have a number of numbered compartments with slots in which cash could be put. The cupboards were hung in many restaurants and were also found in schools and shops, where the change given was used to save money. They were made available free of charge by banks and savings banks as part of the support for community savings, with a label from the respective institute. The cupboard acted as an eye-catcher for the future saver, as a "silent but tireless and free advertiser".

Flowering period and decline

Association savings in Germany experienced a heyday after the First World War , but came to an almost complete standstill during the Second World War . The cooperatives were collected in the German Labor Front , the donation system was set up centrally at the Winter Relief Organization, among others .

Role in the GDR

The GDR ran the (consumer) cooperatives separately from the trade organization , consumption remained a cooperative and was also not the subject of later reprivatisation by the trust company .

In the GDR itself, club life and gastronomy were subject to considerable restrictions. The important GDR author Willi Bredel shows the divided relationship between communists and social democratic traditions. In his trilogy “Relatives and Acquaintances ”, Bredel describes the family life of the social democratic Hamburg workforce at the beginning of the 20th century with humor and precise knowledge of the milieu based on the Maienblüte savings association in Hamburg. After 1934, Bredel was no longer able to openly defend the KPD's original social fascism thesis; Bredel concealed his account of the allegedly failed social democracy in dense family novels that were also recognized in the West. The savings association serves as a junction for the various threads in the novel and is described as the original cover organization for the workers' movement under the socialist laws , also stubbornness and revisionism are shown on the basis of club life. A possible explanation for Bredel's recourse to Hamburg and its strong KPD lies in the prehistory in Saxony . Especially in the years 1928–1930, the communists had tried in vain to gain a foothold in the social democratic cooperative system or the trade unions, which had been established there early, or to convert savings associations into communist combat organizations, but encountered bitter resistance.

Resurgence in the West after 1948

After the currency reform in the western occupation zones, many of the savings clubs were founded or re-established there.

Local banks and savings banks often recommended and supported this form of savings because it served to » promote the sense of economy « and paved the way for Club members to soon become individual customers of the respective bank from »indirect savers«. The financial institutions made contact with innkeepers and business owners (for example hairdressers or retailers) and promoted the installation of a savings cabinet in the business and guest rooms. They helped found local associations, for example by selecting suitable people for the association's board of directors, issued sample statutes and, in addition to a savings locker, also made forms, books and money bags available free of charge. A representative of the bank or savings bank was often present at the time of disbursements with congratulations and good advice. The size of the savings associations grew rapidly: In 1950, 143 savings banks still supported association savings, with sales of 14.08 million German marks , two years later there were 333 savings banks with sales of 49.23 million marks. In Hamburg alone there are said to have been 2,800 of the clubs with 185,000 depositors around 1965.

In the years after the Second World War, banks also tried to set up savings cabinets independently of savings associations in their own administration, for example in shops. This was soon discontinued: the effort involved and the costs of maintaining individual accounts did not stand up to the comparison with savings associations.

The initial support of the savings associations was followed by a slow withdrawal of the financial institutions in the 1980s and 1990s. To this day, banks still allow simple account management for the proceeds from collective savings : Savings books and joint accounts are still permitted and widespread for registered savings associations. However, the savings associations must handle the organization and procurement of aids independently.

Regardless of this, community savings in restaurants are still used in many places today. The largest manufacturer of savings cabinets in Germany has produced over 800,000 of the boxes since 1922, of which at least 250,000 are still in use, according to the company.

Process of small savings in the savings association

The terms Spargemeinschaft, Sparklub and Sparverein are mostly used synonymously today. According to an assessment by the weekly newspaper Die Zeit, what is common is a motivation to become a member that is clearly oriented towards social gathering and less towards wealth accumulation, which is expressed in the joint activities of the groups. A uniform legal form is not specified, but in most cases these are unregistered associations . Processes and activities of the groups are usually regulated in a statute . There are no overarching, uniform rules, but in most savings associations you will encounter typical practices:

Regular deposits

The members of the savings club undertake to regularly put at least a fixed amount of money in the savings box. That this should happen when visiting the restaurant while consuming food and drinks in the company of other club members is not specified, but it is definitely intended. If you miss payments, you have to pay a penalty fee, depending on the regulation, or you get this deducted from your balance . If the savings delay persists, many clubs provide for the member to be excluded. Often, however, regulations are also agreed for social emergencies, which enable a pause for savings.

cashier

At regular intervals, for example once a week, all storage compartments are emptied, the contents are counted and the process is documented in a notebook so that the amount of each member's deposits is recorded. The savings are then immediately paid into an interest-bearing account at a bank. If the balance there exceeds a specified value, it can be transferred to a fixed-term deposit account , which enables a higher interest rate .

Payout ceremony

At the end of a savings year, many clubs set this date in the run-up to Christmas , the savings deposits are paid out in a festive setting. Whether the entire savings deposit is paid out or a part of it is used to cover the costs of the celebration is regulated differently. In almost all cases, admission fees (if agreed), fines and interest are invested in the payout ceremony. The celebrations can take place in the “clubhouse” or in another setting; Every Sparklub develops its own forms and traditions for their design. Some communities organize a joint excursion instead of a celebration, others do both. The organization of a raffle to improve the budget for the payment celebrations is also conceivable.

Topicality

According to Hans Dieter Seibel, the mobilization of private savings in rural finance had long been neglected in development policy. The reason that the people there are too poor to save is considered refuted. In West and Central Africa, and also in parts of Southeast Asia, private pick-up savings for a fee as a local informal financial institution has therefore become widespread in the last few decades, alongside self-help savings associations and municipal natural produce funds. For microfinance institutions , this mobilization of savings is potentially and in many cases actually a significant source of funding.

Trivia and delegated use

There are examples of curious forms of savings: The Austrian piglet ring, for example, fattened a plastic piggy bank that was filled with the common deposits and opened after 9 months weighing over 12 kg over a bathtub. Strange names are also occasionally used, for example at the Farchant Spar and Stopsel Club . The police savings association Basel-Stadt or the savings club “ Katzbach Miau” refer to the origin and background of the savers. In the case of Christmas savings associations, for example the same in Ennigloh and the surrounding area or the Karlstadt-Mühlbach-Laudenbach Christmas savings association , the payout period is also specified. In 1932, there was a coal and mazes savings association in the Jewish community of Wiener Neustadt .

The saying we are not the savings club , similar to Bayern net on the burning soup therefore swam alludes to exaggerated pettiness or petty bourgeois behavior and origin. Hermes Phettberg was one of the founders of the theater group “Sparverein Die Unz-Ertrennlichen” in Vienna. The alternative theater group, which received much attention in the late 1980s, only ever used the side entrance of the playhouses. A Luckenwalder resistance group in the Third Reich, which procured money, food and food stamps for people in hiding, named itself under the cover name Sparverein Hoher Einsatz .

Christian Hornung's documentary Some Had Crocodiles about the Hamburg district of St. Pauli deals with the savings clubs and their members that have remained there.

literature

  • Association savings: Leaflet for association and club savings . Sparkassenverlag, Stuttgart 1953.
  • Freddie Röckenhaus , Goggi Strauss: Always liquid. In: ZEIT magazine. No. 45, November 1, 1991.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Vereinssparen, p. 6.
  2. ^ Karl Eugen Ritter: The savings contract in the name of a third party. Dissertation of the law faculty of the Friedrich-Alexander-Universität zu Erlangen, 1960, p. 13.
  3. ↑ a b c d e Always liquid. ZEIT magazine.
  4. ^ Statutes of the private savings association Stadtamhof from 1865 . 1865 ( limited preview in Google Book search).
  5. ↑ The purpose savings associations (Liedke'sche associations) | Genossenschaftsgeschichte.info. In: genossenschaftsgeschichte.info. Retrieved February 22, 2016 .
  6. ↑ a b c Michael Prinz: Bread and Dividend: Consumer associations in Germany and England before 1914 . Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 1996, ISBN 3-525-35775-3 , pp. 250 ff . ( limited preview in Google Book search).
  7. ^ House of the History of the Federal Republic of Germany, Contemporary History Forum Leipzig: Neighbors friends: Germany - Austria; Book accompanying the exhibition in the House of History of the Federal Republic of Germany, Bonn, 19 May to 23 October 2005; in the Contemporary History Forum Leipzig, June 2 to October 9, 2006; in Vienna 2006 . Kerber, 2005, p. 51 ( limited preview in Google Book search).
  8. ^ Alfred Böttcher: The German employee banks . In: Jahrbuch für Nationalökonomie und Statistik / Journal of Economics and Statistics . tape 69 (124) , no. 3/4 , 1926, p. 339-350 , JSTOR : 23823289 .
  9. ^ Anna Schiener: The municipal savings bank Amberg in the 19th century. A contribution to the economic and social history of the Upper Palatinate. (Regensburg contributions to regional history. 14). Archive of the St. Katharinenspital Regensburg - edition vulpes, Regensburg 2013, ISBN 978-3-939112-69-3 , p. 296 ff.
  10. ↑ Stephan Mwathi: The housing association as part of the construction industry through the ages the example of the cooperative Biberach eG diplom.de, 2002, ISBN 3-8324-5578-7 ( limited preview in Google Book Search).
  11. ↑ Josef Rieger, Max Mendel, Walther Postelt: The consumer cooperative "Production", 1899-1949, history of a cooperative consumer association from the foundation to the fiftieth business deal and its predecessors. Hamburg 1949.
  12. ^ Simone Lässig: Jewish ways into the middle class: cultural capital and social advancement in the 19th century . Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, 2004, ISBN 3-525-36840-2 , pp. 510 ff . ( limited preview in Google Book Search - footnote 262).
  13. ↑ a b Christina von Braun: What was German Judaism ?: 1870–1933 . Walter de Gruyter, 2015, ISBN 978-3-11-040055-7 ( limited preview in the Google book search - page number is not displayed, occupied content is clear and can be traced via the link. The Central Association of Eastern Jewish Organizations was in charge).
  14. ↑ a b Have a beer at the Sparkasse - the coming and going of the savings cupboards. In: Augsburger Allgemeine. Retrieved January 24, 2016 .
  15. ↑ Vereinssparen, p. 17.
  16. ^ Mathias Bertram: Literary epoch diagnoses of the post-war period in German memory: Berlin contributions to the prose of the post-war years (1945-1960) . Ed .: Ursula Heukenkamp. Erich Schmidt Verlag, 2000, ISBN 3-503-04948-7 , p. 165 ( limited preview in Google Book search).
  17. ^ Willi Bredel: Documents of his life. Aufbau-Verlag, 1961, p. 31.
  18. ^ Carsten Voigt: Combat leagues of the workers' movement: the Reichsbanner Schwarz-Rot-Gold and the Rote Frontkampfbund in Saxony 1924–1933 . Böhlau Verlag, Cologne / Weimar 2009, ISBN 978-3-412-20449-5 , pp. 513 ff . ( limited preview in Google Book search).
  19. ↑ Vereinssparen, p. 9.
  20. ↑ Vereinssparen, p. 29.
  21. ↑ Katharina Schipkowski: Saving: Better to have something in the box . In: The time . ISSN  0044-2070 (details in the receipt according to the Sparkasse historical documentation center.).
  22. ↑ Vereinssparen, p. 14.
  23. ↑ Christmas bonus thanks to the savings box. In: Saarbrücker Zeitung from September 9, 2008. Online ( Memento from April 2, 2015 in the Internet Archive )
  24. ^ Press release from Nordia GmbH from October 1, 2002.
  25. ^ A b Hans Dieter Seibel: Microfinance instead of microcredit. a regulatory concept to promote self-help structures. (PDF) In: Hunger: Causes, Consequences, Remedies; an interdisciplinary controversy. 2012, pp. 339–359, quoted from the linked excerpt from hf.uni-koeln.de
  26. ↑ Michael Martischnig: Associations as carriers of folk culture in the present using the example of Mattersburg . Austrian Academy of Sciences, 1982, ISBN 3-7001-0464-2 ( limited preview in the Google book search).
  27. ↑ The named examples are all given by the DNB with their own entry
  28. ^ Werner Sulzgruber: The history of the Jewish community in Wiener Neustadt. In: David. Issue 68, April 2006.
  29. ^ "Hermes Phettberg, Elender: a film by Kurt Palm" In: Phettberg - the film homepage. URL: phettberg-derfilm.at ( Memento of the original from January 9, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. also with Kurt Palm : The only fun in town: 5000 years of savings association Die Unzertrennlichen. Sonderzahl-Verlag-Ges., 1994. @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.phettberg-derfilm.at
  30. ↑ Barbara Schieb-Samizadeh: The community for peace and construction. A little known resistance group.  In: Dachauer Hefte.  7, 1991, pp. 174-190.