Washington, DC (December 22, 2003) – The ESOP Association released today data on shared capitalism programs in the US that was collected from a series of questions on the just released General Social Survey (GSS), which is the premier survey of social data in America. (The GSS was administered to a national random sample of working adults and is funded primarily by the National Science Foundation and conducted by the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago.)
The ESOP Association and its 501(c)(3) affiliate, the Employee Ownership Foundation, provided significant funding for the series of questions on shared capitalism. (Shared capitalism is defined as broad-based employee, current or deferred, stock compensation programs, such as ESOPs, stock purchases, stock options, gainsharing, profit sharing, and bonus programs.) The shared capitalism series of questions were developed and analyzed by well-known employee ownership researchers Dr.’s Joseph Blasi and Douglas Kruse (School of Management and Labor Relations at Rutgers University), and Dr. Richard Freeman (Harvard University) for the Shared Capitalism Project of the National Bureau of Economic Research in Cambridge, Massachusetts.
The survey confirms that an overwhelming number of Americans are heavily vested in company stock and provides strong proof that employee stock ownership programs are growing. According to the results, out of 108 million people in the US who work in the private-sector, 21 percent of employees own company stock and 13 percent hold stock options. Out of the 60 million people who work for companies with stock, approximately 40 percent of employees own company stock and another 25 percent holding stock options.
“While Presidents since 1980, and an overwhelming majority of Senators and Representatives have endorsed and supported laws to increase employee stock ownership, particularly ESOPs, the nation needs to develop a deeper, more coherent game plan to promote a more fair and equitable distribution of stock ownership beyond the privileged few,” said Association President Michael Keeling. “Our nation and its leaders need to make sure our nation’s employee stock ownership policies are good for employees, good for employers, and good for America. This is why the top legislative priority of The ESOP Association right now is the creation of a Presidential Commission on employee ownership, with input from employee owners. I call on President Bush, members of his cabinet, and our Congressional leaders to take note of these numbers, and join an effort, such as a Presidential Commission on employee ownership, to make employee stock ownership fair, equitable, and more widespread in America.”
Founded in 1978, The ESOP Association represents over 1,300 ESOP companies and 750,000 employee owners who believe that employee ownership will improve American competitiveness, increase productivity through greater employee participation and strengthen our free enterprise economy.