DIETZ SUPPORTED, COOP ATTACKED

To the Editors of the CRIMSON:

I would support Mr. Diets' call for new management at the Coop but for different reasons. In the little black book given to members there is the following statement:

Object: The object of the Harvard Co-operative Society is to reduce the cost of living at Technology, Harvard, Episcopal Theological School, and Radcliffe. It exists solely for that purpose and endeavors to afford especial facilities for the purchase of all kinds of students' supplies.

The object of the Coop has very obviously long since been forgotten by the management. It has been abandoned in favor of the search for greater and greater profits. How can the Officers of the Coop reconcile their supposed objective with the following facts?

(1) The Coop charges $5.50 for MacMillan's Smith translation of Kant's Critique of Pure Reason. It is available at Mandrake's for $5.

(2) The Coop charges $7.50 for Sisler's College Chemistry text. The same book is sold at the City College Bookstore in New York for 36.

(3) The Coop sells the Lightoller desk lamp for $12.95. It could have been purchased at Jordan Marsh for $11.50....

Even with the ten per cent or eight per cent "patronage refund" (even that is now threatened), one usually pays as much or more for merchandise at the Coop as would be paid at other stores around Boston. In textbooks, of course, the Coop enjoys a monopoly on University reading lists which protects it from effective competition in the Square. And it almost uniformly offers the poorest prices in the Square on used books (which it will not even buy back until after the book buying rush, effectively forcing students to buy new or elsewhere).

Rather than being an institution dedicated to lowering the cost of living for students, the Coop has become one somewhat reminiscent of the colossal and mighty trusts and monopolies of America's great Robber Barons.... C. Thaddeus Stanley '68