ABSTRACT
The remarkable program initiated by Lever Brothers, one of the biggest corporations on earth, was the representation of co-partnership schemes that aimed at greater efficiency. This scheme, whose announced goal was increased efficiency, was inaugurated by William Lever, the company's founder and one of the most energetic and colorful men in the annals of British industry. The co-partnership scheme Lever instituted in 1909 continued until his death in 1925, after which time it was neglected and yet survived until 1929, when the company, Lever Brothers, was amalgamated with a Dutch corporation to become Unilever. Lever's model village and the co-partnership scheme were an interesting combination of philanthropy and calculated management policy. Lever's entrepeneurial conviction naturally led him to the total rejection of the labor theory of value. The idea of profit-sharing 'overtook' Lever as early as 1888. He studied the existing profit-sharing schemes closly, particularly that of the Maison Leclaire in Paris which was the first such system.
