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Policy Brief on the Study, “Employee Share Ownership, Management Practices, and Labor Productivity: An Analysis Using Establishment Level Micro-Data from the US Census”
May 29, 2026
Economic Opportunities Program
Fidan Ana Kurtulus
Department of Economics, University of Massachusetts Amherst
Eric Hoyt
Department of Economics, University of Rhode Island
Paige Ouimet
Department of Finance, University of North Carolina Chapel Hill
Joseph Blasi
School of Management and Labor Relations, Rutgers University
Douglas Kruse
School of Management and Labor Relations, Rutgers University
Richard Freeman
Department of Economics, Harvard University
William Castellano
School of Management and Labor Relations, Rutgers University
We estimate that employee stock ownership plan (ESOP) adoption increases labor productivity at the workplace by 5.6 – 6.7%, accounting for workplace managerial and organizational practices, number of employees, capital and materials inputs into production, union status, and geography. To estimate this, we compiled the largest and most comprehensive data to date on broad-based employee equity ownership at both privately held and publicly traded companies in US manufacturing industries. Specifically, we combined three restricted US Census micro-databases – the 2010 and 2015 Census Management and Organizational Practices Survey (MOPS), the Annual Survey of Manufactures (ASM), and the US Longitudinal Business Database (LBD) – with the US Department of Labor’s Form 5500 Pension Database.
About the Rutgers Institute for the Study of Employee Ownership and Profit Sharing
The purpose of the Institute for the Study of Employee Ownership and Profit Sharing is to study the various models that have emerged and will emerge of employee ownership shares and profit shares in the corporation and society of the United States and around the world.
About the Economic Opportunities Program
The Aspen Institute Economic Opportunities Program advances strategies, policies, and ideas to help low- and moderate-income people thrive in a changing economy.
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