Unlocking the potential of employee ownership in Canada

April 19, 2024| News release

TORONTO, Apr. 19, 2024 – Social Capital Partners welcomes the federal government’s decision to explore options to unlock the potential of employee ownership trusts (EOTs) as part of Canada’s economic recovery. This is a first step toward making broad-based employee ownership a more significant part of our economy.  Social Capital Partners produced Building an Employee Ownership Economy in October 2020, a report calling for the establishment of EOTs in Canada, as a way to grow Canada’s comparatively low levels of employee ownership.

“There is a large body of research from around the world that points to employee ownership trusts as a powerful tool to reduce wealth inequality, support business succession, protect local jobs, and promote economic resilience,” says Jon Shell, managing partner of Social Capital Partners. “It’s great to see the government recognize that employee ownership could be part of rebuilding a more inclusive, more resilient economy.”

In the US and the UK, employee-owned companies grow faster, pay better, are less prone to lay-offs or bankruptcies in economic downturns, and are more likely to keep jobs in local economies. Due to public policy that encourages their use, EOTs are a popular structure for business succession in those countries, where they have generated significant wealth for front-line employees. EOTs are common in the US, where 14 million employees own $1.4 trillion in shares at over 6,000 companies. Since their introduction in the UK in 2014, they have become increasingly popular, with almost 100 companies becoming employee-owned in 2019 alone. Canada does not have a business structure comparable to the employee ownership trust.

“There is a large body of research from around the world that points to employee ownership trusts as a powerful tool to reduce wealth inequality, support business succession, protect local jobs and promote economic resilience.”

A recent survey by the Canadian Federation of Independent Business (CFIB) suggests significant interest among Canadian business owners in employee ownership. Fifty-nine percent of respondents were either strongly or somewhat in favour of introducing policies similar to the US and UK, and 53% said they were more likely to sell to their employees if such a policy were introduced.

“Canadian business owners are very community-oriented.  We think employee ownership in Canada can be even more successful than the US and UK with the right policies in place,” said Shell. “That would mean more Canadian companies staying Canadian-owned.”

Canada’s current regulatory environment makes selling to employees very difficult. “As a business owner who believes in the power of employee ownership, I’m really excited to see it in the budget. It’s been very difficult, and taken a very long time, for me to sell some of my company to my employees. It should be a lot easier,” said Peter Deitz, Co-Founder and Board Chair of Grantbook. His comments echo those of Geoff Smith, CEO of EllisDon, one of Canada’s largest employee-owned companies, in a video he posted this past month encouraging the government to implement employee ownership trusts.

“Given the benefits, a made-in Canada approach to broad-based employee ownership should be a priority for policymakers that are looking to strengthen Canada’s economic recovery and increase the well-being of Canadians over the long-term,” says Shell.

Alternative ownership Employee Ownership Canada (EOC)

Share with a friend

Related reading

Blog

Five ways for the public service to confront monsters and chaos

Canada's political and bureaucratic leaders are quickly trying to re-wire the federal government to confront a belligerent Unites States, but systems can’t deliver what they were not designed for. This is a time like no other in our history, writes Matthew Mendelsohn, and those making decisions have not been trained for this—because we haven’t experienced anything like this before.  Drawing on his own time in Ottawa, he walks us through five  priority “machinery of government” changes our public service needs to make to meet the threat of an increasingly authoritarian, imperialist America.

BlogThe Ownership Solution
overhead shot of burnaby BC refinery

Four key steps can help secure Canadian sovereignty

Gas station giant Parkland is already shedding Canadian employees in the wake of TX-based Sunoco’s recent takeover of the Canadian fuel chain, which owns 15% of our gas stations and a key refinery in Burnaby, B.C. These layoffs were a predictable outcome of Ottawa's decision not to flex its new regulatory muscle through the Canada Investment Act to quash foreign investment deals that pose an economic security threat. As SCP chair Jon Shell writes, the government has not defined a clear strategy to build and maintain Canadian ownership of our assets. Combined with the federal budget’s focus on attracting private capital, there’s a real danger that Ottawa will enable a sell-off of Canadian firms to foreign investors.

Blog

What the new World Inequality Report tells us, and why it matters for Canada

The 2026 World Inequality Report is out and the results paint a picture of a world in which a tiny minority commands unprecedented financial power, while billions remain excluded from even basic economic stability. As SCP Director of Policy Dan Skilleter writes, Canada is far from immune to these global trends: although our own GDP keeps rising, wealth gains have been concentrated at the very top, while many households struggle to afford food and housing. The top 1% in Canada hold about 29.3% of total wealth, making our country's wealth inequality even more pronounced than our own Canadian Parliamentary Budget Officer reports. The good news is, momentum is building in Canada for better wealth data, shedding light on our "Billionaire Blindspot."

Skip to content