The MyceliaAk blog

Where are worker cooperatives thriving?

yaso.thiru@gmail.com (Yaso Thiru) — Sat, 29 Oct 2022 03:26:51 GMT

Home care cooperatives- a need for Alaska

A recent study* by Capital Impact Partners found several basic goods and services industry sectors becoming increasingly successful in converting to employee-owned businesses. They identified home care agencies, residential facilities, child care centers, grocery stores, and food manufacturing businesses as good targets for cooperative conversions. The cooperative shared ownership business model is helping save jobs, and create and expand wealth for employees and neighborhoods.

While the study's target was the major metropolitan areas, the findings is reflective of labor shortages we are facing here in Alaska for homecare for the elderly, and child care. High burnout and low wages in these areas are creating huge exodus of labor from these segments. These sectors that support our children and the elderly cannot remain low-wage service sectors for obvious reasons. Shared ownership models enable employees the flexibility and opportunities for living wages jobs and wealth creation.

Alaska needs a strong ecosystem to support employee ownership, capital access and technical assistance for cooperatives. MyceliaAk is working to promote a healthy ecosystem for worker cooperatives in Alaska through education, awareness, and advocacy.

* https://icagroup.org/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/Co-op-Conversions-At-Scale.pdf

Future of Cooperatives

yaso.thiru@gmail.com (Yaso Thiru) — Sat, 29 Oct 2022 01:41:53 GMT

A movement to create cooperative enterprises

Today we are increasingly seeing a movement to create cooperative enterprises. As baby boomer business owners approach retirement age many small communities are turning to worker cooperatives to sustain businesses that supported the communities. As COVID surged in 2020, the Evergreen Foundation in Cleveland acquired at pre COVID prices small businesses that closed their doors permanently to convert to worker cooperatives. This served to save employment and sustain services to communities that depended on these businesses for basic goods and services. To this end the Evergreen Cooperatives launched a fund for employee ownership. A study by project Equity reports that a vast majority of the small business owners have no succession plan in place. Cooperatives offer the opportunity to keep many of these locally owned businesses in the community for long-term positive impact.

https://project-equity.org/communities/small-business-closure-crisis/

https://www.evgoh.com/2021/08/11/evergreen-cooperatives-helps-companies-shift-to-co-ops-share-profits-with-workers/

If you are a natural collaborator you could be a cooperative entrepreneur

yaso.thiru@gmail.com (Yaso Thiru) — Sat, 29 Oct 2022 00:57:18 GMT

Cooperatives are not for everyone

Cooperatives are not for everyone. People who are naturally inclined to collaborate and thrive in team environments are successful in a cooperative business or nonprofit environment. We are socialized in a world where competition and winning are valued. Healthy competition can encourage innovation and unimaginable human accomplishments. However, competition in a collaborative mode creates more winners than one. It is easier to be an individualist than a collaborator. I can single handedly decide where to go out to dinner quickly and be fully satisfied with my choice. It is not easy to make this decision for a family with varied preferences for food. If you are a natural negotiator and feel good about finding a middle ground for everyone's satisfaction, you are a cooperator.

Why we promote worker-owned cooperatives in Alaska

Fri, 28 Oct 2022 23:16:06 GMT

Together we thrive

The recent COVID pandemic has brought to surface the precarious nature of our economic future. As I write this, relief from state and federal government have run out but contrary to what was expected, people aren't lining up to get jobs they lost or left during COVID. Instead, small businesses are struggling to fill vacancies and many are closing their doors.

State economic developers are blaming net migration as the reason for labor shortage - more people moving out of state than those coming in to Alaska. Small business owners facing employee shortage are saying that potential employees are asking for living wages and benefits that their businesses cannot afford.

We think everyone has the right to pursue prosperity- this means earning a living wage, living debt-free, owning a home, and having access to affordable health care. How do we reconcile these two seemingly irreconcilable needs: affordable labor for businesses and living wages for employees? If no new solutions are put forth the problems of unemployment, mental health, physical and social wellbeing of our families and neighbors will deepen further.

In the case of small individually owned businesses, the solution lies in spreading the risks, responsibilities, and rewards of the single owner to many. This is possible when the investors are the individual entrepreneur, the local community (individuals and philanthropic organizations), and the future employees. This is a key feature of worker owned cooperatives.

In a worker cooperative the capital providers are primarily the worker owners. The local communities, philanthropic and anchor institutions who have a stake in the prosperity and wellbeing of the people provide the initial seed capital to start the cooperative businesses. Hired workers are trained on the job to both operate and manage the business and to become owners over time. Initial community and philanthropic investors stay or exit after a time, providing a pathway for workers to build equity ownership in the business. In a worker cooperative employees share ownership as well as its responsibilities, risks, and rewards. With equitable distribution of profits and fair wages, worker cooperatives make it possible for workers to earn living wages and to accumulate generational wealth while providing returns to the local communities who invest in them.

Some worker owned cooperative examples include Mondragon Corporation (Spain), Evergreen Cooperative (USA), Cafe L'Artere (Canada), and Equal Exchange (USA).

MyceliaAk (www.myceliaak.com) is a local project to help communities create worker owned enterprises. Please contact us through the home page if you want to learn more about worker cooperatives and the work we do.