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Is Employee Ownership a Key to Worker Wealth?

Private equity executive Pete Stavros has emerged as an unlikely employee ownership advocate

He says giving the rank and file a stake in their companies is good for. Private equity executive Pete Stavros has emerged as an unlikely employee ownership advocate He says giving the rank and file a stake in their companies is good. Private equity executive Pete Stavros has emerged as an unlikely employee ownership advocate He says giving the rank and file a stake in their companies is good.

The idea Stavros says is simple Give rank-and-file workers a stake in their company on top of salary plus a voice in how the business is run day-to.

Stavros says it’s only fair to share the risk and the reward, and in many cases, it works really well. Stavros says about 70% of the employee-owned companies do better financially than competitors. But even if the company does not do well, employees have a say as to its future.

Take the case of a mattress manufacturing company in Mississippi. Sales started to dip during the recession, and the founders approached their employees to ask them to forgo pay raises, retire early, and invest in the company. The employees agreed, and when business started to improve, the worker-owners were rewarded with stock and profit sharing.

Stavros says, “The problem in the US is low-to-middle-income employees are losing ground on average. All of the value creation is going to people at the top of the economy. They're doing very well, and most people are stuck with stagnant wages."

"One key to building wealth is giving people an opportunity to invest, and one simple way to do it is give them a piece of their company.”