Resource Sharing Agreements for MAGs

The Problem With Informal Sharing

A group of good people who like each other will share resources naturally at first. When a neighbor's generator dies on day 2 of an outage, you help. When someone runs short of fuel, you give them some.

This works fine for short events. Extended scenarios expose the limit of informal generosity: people start doing mental accounting. They start to feel like some members are getting more than they're contributing. Vague mutual aid commitments develop different interpretations. Someone who gave freely in month one starts getting quiet about their supply level in month three.

The resentment isn't a character failure — it's a predictable response to an unclear social contract. The solution is to make the contract explicit before the scenario starts.

Elinor Ostrom, who won the Nobel Prize in Economics for her work on managing shared resources, identified clear boundaries and rules as the first requirement for sustainable commons management. A MAG's shared resources are a commons. The same principles apply.

Categories of Sharing

Resource sharing falls into three categories that require different approaches:

Consumables (food, fuel, medical supplies): These are depleted by sharing and cannot be returned. Sharing agreements for consumables need to address what triggers sharing (the threshold condition), how much is shared, and whether/how the contribution is tracked.

Non-consumable equipment (generators, tools, vehicles, medical equipment): These are borrowed, used, and returned. Sharing agreements for equipment need to address access conditions, maintenance responsibility, priority in conflict, and what happens if the item is damaged.

Labor and skills: Time, expertise, and physical capacity. A nurse's medical knowledge, a mechanic's repair skills, someone's ability to do physical work. Labor sharing is the most reciprocal and the most sensitive.

Consumables: Sharing Threshold and Accounting

Defining the Sharing Threshold

The sharing threshold is the condition that triggers a sharing obligation. Three common approaches:

Abundance sharing: You share when you have more than you need for your defined planning period. If you have 12 months of food and the scenario is estimated at 6 months, the 6-month surplus can be shared. This requires members to disclose their supply levels, which some members are uncomfortable with.

Hardship sharing: You share when another household would otherwise suffer harm. A family running out of critical medications, a household without heat in dangerous temperatures. This is lower commitment and respects privacy, but only kicks in at crisis level.

Percentage sharing: All households contribute a defined percentage of specific resources to a shared pool. 10% of fuel, 10% of food staples. This requires relative equity in member resources and works better in groups that have been transparent about supply levels.

Most MAGs use some combination: abundance sharing for resources where members are comfortable with disclosure, hardship sharing as the fallback for everything else.

Tracking Consumables

Whether and how to track sharing is a values question. Options:

No tracking: Sharing is unconditional within the agreed threshold. This works in high-trust groups for short to medium scenarios. It fails when scenarios extend and some members feel they've given more than others.

Ledger accounting: Record what's given and received. Creates clarity but also creates a transactional dynamic that can feel cold and generates resentment when ledger imbalances accumulate.

Unit exchange: Establish a rough equivalency between different resources ("1 gallon of gas = X meals = X hours of skilled labor"). This enables flexible accounting without strict quid pro quo. The equivalencies are rough and negotiated, not precise.

For most MAGs, a light ledger — recording significant transfers without obsessive tracking of small ones — strikes the best balance.

Equipment: Access Protocols

For non-consumable equipment, the agreement should specify:

What equipment is in the shared pool: List specific items, their normal location, and who is responsible for their maintenance.

Access conditions: Under what circumstances can another household use the equipment? No-notice access for emergencies? Advance notice for planned use? Only when the owner is present?

Priority rules: If two households need the generator simultaneously, who has priority? Define the tiebreaker before the conflict.

Maintenance responsibility: Who is responsible for keeping shared equipment in working order? Fuel, oil, battery maintenance. When the generator fails because it wasn't maintained, whose responsibility was it?

Damage protocol: If borrowed equipment is damaged or destroyed, what's the remedy? No-fault policy (accidents happen in emergencies)? Proportional replacement? This should be decided before the scenario, not after.

Sample Equipment Sharing Protocol

Generator: [Owner Household]
  Access condition: Any household facing safety risk (hypothermia,
    medical equipment) may request. Routine use requires 24-hour notice.
  Priority: Medical equipment first. Heat for household with elderly/
    infants second. All other uses by negotiation.
  Fuel responsibility: Requesting household provides equivalent fuel.
  Maintenance: Owner maintains. All households contribute to fuel reserve.
  Damage: Shared replacement cost from group fund if damaged in shared use.

Labor and Skills: The Reciprocity Expectation

Labor sharing is the most valuable and most sensitive resource in a MAG. The nurse who treats wounds, the mechanic who keeps vehicles running, the builder who repairs a damaged roof — these people are contributing something that cannot simply be replaced.

The expectation of reciprocity should be explicit but not transactional. "We help each other" is both true and too vague. Clarify:

What skills are freely shared: Basic life safety — medical emergencies, immediate physical danger. These are not accounted or tracked.

What skills are shared in rotation: Ongoing maintenance tasks, security watch, food production work. These should be distributed equitably based on capability.

What skills represent professional-grade work: If your MAG's mechanic spends significant time keeping the whole group's vehicles running, their contribution should be recognized and reciprocated in the accounting. "Your skill is worth more so you work for free while everyone else is equal" is not a sustainable arrangement.

Building the Agreement

Step 1: Inventory What Members Are Willing to Share

Start with what members are comfortable sharing before setting group expectations. Go around the group:

• What equipment would you share, under what conditions?
• What consumable resources would you share, at what threshold?
• What skills are you willing to provide, under what conditions?

This surfaces both what's available and what expectations are realistic.

Step 2: Identify Critical Shared Needs

What does the group need that no single household provides? Medical supplies? Communication equipment? A generator? A water filtration system? These define where the group should collectively invest and how that investment is governed.

Step 3: Write the Agreement

The agreement doesn't need to be long. One to two pages covering:

• What's in the shared equipment pool and the protocols for each major item
• The consumables sharing threshold for each major category
• The labor sharing expectation
• What happens when someone leaves the group
• The dispute resolution process

Step 4: Review and Update

Review the agreement annually and after any significant change in group membership or circumstances. An agreement written when the group was five households may need adjustment when it grows to ten.

Common Agreement Failures

| Failure | Prevention | |---------|------------| | Vague sharing conditions | Write specific threshold conditions, not "when someone needs help" | | No damage protocol | Decide the damage remedy before anything is damaged | | Skills not reciprocated | Explicitly acknowledge high-contribution skills in the accounting | | Agreement never discussed again | Annual review at the group's planning meeting | | Departure not covered | Write the departure protocol before anyone leaves |