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Employee Ownership in Rural Communities
For owners, policy makers, and employees looking to understand how employee ownership can benefit rural communities and learn about the experience of other rural businesses that took this path.
Hometown Ownership: The Impact of Employee Ownership in Rural Communities
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Suggest questionRural communities looking to improve economic opportunities and retain jobs and community wealth know employee ownership can help them achieve these objectives. In fact, some of the states, towns, and cities with the densest number of employee owned-companies are in primarily rural areas. These companies range from small worker cooperatives in agriculture and energy to medium and large companies in manufacturing and construction, among other sectors. During this panel conversation, we’ll hear from elected officials and employee-owned companies in rural areas about the important role of employee ownership in their communities and the lessons they have learned about bringing shared prosperity to rural areas. Speakers include:
Daniel Goldstein, Chief Executive Officer, Go ESOP LLC; Executive Fellow, Rutgers Institute for the Study of Employee Ownership and Profit Sharing
Molly Hemstreet, Founder and Co-Executive Director, The Industrial Commons; Executive Fellow, Rutgers Institute for the Study of Employee Ownership and Profit Sharing
Jenny Levy, Executive Vice President, People, Community & Environment, Hypertherm
Michael Williams, CFO, Black & Veatch
Jeff Guo, Co-host and Reporter for Planet Money, NPR (moderator)
This video comes from the second Employee Ownership Ideas Forum, hosted by the Aspen Institute Economic Opportunities Program and the Rutgers Institute for the Study of Employee Ownership and Profit Sharing. Our 2024 Forum, “Employee Ownership on the Ground,” brought innovative employee share ownership initiatives and speakers from around the country to Washington DC to highlight how this bipartisan approach to improving jobs, wealth creation, and business performance is helping create more equitable economies in states, cities, and rural communities.
For clips and highlights from the Forum, subscribe to the Economic Opportunities Program on YouTube:
And tune in to our podcast to listen to full discussions on the go:
For more from the Forum — including videos, photos, audio, transcripts, and additional resources — visit:
About The Aspen Institute
Government has played a critical role throughout the history of the US in launching and supporting employee ownership. Today, the US Departments of Treasury, Commerce, Agriculture, and Labor and the Small Business Administration support employee ownership through financing and lending, regulatory reform, technical assistance, market development, and more, as they help business owners, workers, and local governments across red and blue states to grow worker ownership. In this conversation, speakers discuss what the executive branch is currently doing to support employee ownership and how those efforts can be improved to offer more workers a shot at the American dream through ownership. It features a panel discussion with Rajesh Nayak (Assistant Secretary for Policy, US Department of Labor), Dr. Karama Neal (Administrator, Rural Business-Cooperative Service, US Department of Agriculture), Melissa Hoover (Senior Fellow, Rutgers Institute for the Study of Employee Ownership and Profit Sharing; Founder and Co-Executive Director, Democracy at Work Institute), David Hincapie (Economic Development Specialist, Veteran Business Development Officer, Washington Metropolitan Area District Office, US Small Business Administration), and moderator Maureen Conway (Vice President, The Aspen Institute; Executive Director, Economic Opportunities Program). For more information about this event — including video, audio, transcript, speaker bios, and additional resources — visit: https://www.aspeninstitute.org/videos/unleashing-an-ownership-economy-the-role-of-government-agencies/ This discussion was held on June 14, 2023, as part of the Employee Ownership Ideas Forum, co-hosted by the Aspen Institute Economic Opportunities Program and the Institute for the Study of Employee Ownership and Profit Sharing at Rutgers University. This two-day convening brought together leading policymakers, practitioners, experts, and the media for a robust discussion on how we can grow employee ownership for the shared benefit of American workers and businesses. Learn more: https://www.aspeninstitute.org/events/employee-ownership-ideas-forum/