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What being an employee-owned company means to me
For what it’s like to be on the inside of an employee-owned company, we spoke to a few of the 750 employees who recently became 100-per cent owners of Taproot Community Support Services, a social services provider across B.C., Alberta and Ontario. Rewards the employees highlighted include company morale and spirit, for sure. They also include financial rewards paid out annually to each employee as dividends. Last year, each employee would have received about $1000 to $1500 on top of their salaries—and as the company succeeds over time, the employees will share financially in Taproot’s success.
Wealth inequality in Canada is far worse than StatsCan reports
Our government’s best available data on Canada’s wealth gap excludes, by design, the wealthiest families in the country. As SCP Director of Policy Dan Skilleter writes, if we didn’t have the Parliamentary Budget Officer fact-checking Statistics Canada’s work, their numbers would tell us the top one per cent own only 2.5 per cent of all wealth – not nearly 25 per cent of all wealth in Canada, as the PBO reports. We like to think of Canada as a beacon of egalitarianism compared to our southern neighbours, but when you add in data from "rich lists" published by Forbes and Maclean's, our wealth concentration looks quite similar to the U.S.
Watch the video: Is Canada’s wealth gap really as bad as the U.S?
As Canadians, we like to think we’re strong and free. But as SCP's Director of Policy Dan Skilleter explains, when it comes to the wealth gap, we're looking more like America Lite—better manners, but almost all the inequality. The way our economy is set up means that most of the benefits from economic growth go to financial interests and speculators, rather than to workers or other businesses. We can shift economic power to more people and aspiring entrepreneurs by making them owners. When more people have a stake, Canada’s economy works better for everyone—not just investors.