Black Employee Ownership

Employee ownership is not just a business strategy—it’s a pathway to opportunity and prosperity for all, helping ensure everyone has a fair chance to achieve their version of the American Dream.

Expanding access to the American Dream

The American Dream promises opportunity, prosperity and security for all, but persistent wealth inequality has placed this vision out of reach for too many. Black workers, who make up less than 10% of the small business workforce, are disproportionately represented among low- to moderate-income workers and face barriers to wealth-building opportunities that others have long enjoyed.

Employee ownership is a powerful solution that extends the promise of the American Dream to workers and business owners across all backgrounds. By providing employees with ownership stakes, this model builds generational wealth, strengthens communities and creates pathways to economic mobility for those who have historically been excluded.

For Black workers and Black-owned businesses, the impact is particularly meaningful. Converting businesses to employee ownership not only helps preserve Black-owned enterprises but also empowers Black employees to benefit directly from their labor, potentially increasing household income by up to 92%. In cities like Atlanta, where income inequality is stark – the median household income for a Black family is roughly one-third that of a white family, these transitions have the potential to close racial wealth gaps and uplift entire communities.

The opportunity

Almost 3 million businesses in the United States have owners at or near retirement age, many of whom have no plan for what will happen to the business when they retire. Almost one in four of these businesses are in the construction, manufacturing, wholesale trade, warehousing and transportation – industries with significant low-wage workers and workers of color. Helping companies in these industries transition to employee ownership could have staggering effects. Imagine transitioning Atlanta’s 30,000 Silver Tsunami businesses into employee-owned companies. This would result in over 430,000 workers becoming business owners. The potential spillover effects on the Black community would be enormous.

Black Employee Ownership doesn’t single out. It safeguards against exclusion. By integrating strategies to reach communities with significant Black workforces, forming partnerships with local organizations and addressing systemic inequities, Project Equity is working to make sure no one is left behind.

Expanding Black employee ownership

Project Equity is committed to ensuring that Black workers and Black business owners benefit from employee ownership. This commitment spans all of our services, helping to expand access to ownership opportunities, increase wealth-building pathways and strengthen economic participation. Our work includes expanding available data on Black entrepreneurship and workforce density, forming critical partnerships with community-rooted organizations and developing strategies that embed employee ownership within broader Black wealth-building efforts. By integrating employee ownership into economic development conversations, we are advancing solutions that create lasting financial security and prosperity for Black workers and business owners.

Atlanta

Project Equity is working toward lasting impact through its partnerships in Atlanta.

Atlanta

Project Equity is working toward lasting impact through its partnerships in Atlanta.

By the numbers

Nearly 30,000 businesses are over 20 years old. They account for $163 billion in revenue.
These businesses employ almost 430,000 workers.
In addition, one-third of the workforce in Metro Atlanta is Black.

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Miami-Dade County

Project Equity is working toward lasting impact through its partnerships in Miami-Dade County.

Miami-Dade County

Project Equity is working toward lasting impact through its partnerships in Miami-Dade County.

By the numbers

Over 20,140 businesses are more than 20 years old. They account for $70 billion in revenue.
These businesses employ over 242,000 workers.
17% of the workforce in Miami-Dade County is Black.

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Our partners

We would like to extend our gratitude to our collaborators for their partnership and support in this endeavor.

Working with Morehouse College

Alongside our partners at Morehouse College and other collaborators across the country, Project Equity seeks to integrate employee ownership into the Black wealth building agenda and unlock this powerful opportunity for wealth preservation for Black business owners. Together we will also bring wealth building opportunities and quality jobs to thousands of Black workers in the years ahead. Project Equity collaborated with Morehouse College to produce two groundbreaking studies that explore how employee ownership can close the racial wealth gap.

Project Equity and Morehouse College collaborated to produce two groundbreaking papers on the topic of employee ownership and its potential to address the racial wealth gap.

Published June 2023

Broad-based employee ownership sustains quality jobs and builds wealth for employees. It creates stronger and more profitable businesses and preserves the legacy and wealth of small businesses in communities. Project Equity’s publication, Strategies to Advance Black Employee Ownership Employee Ownership offers strategies and practical considerations to advance Black employee ownership as a complement to the Morehouse College paper, Employee Ownership for Black Workers: Closing the Racial Wealth Gap. The paper suggests those strategies should focus on these goals:

Preserving Black wealth for Black business owners through EO transitions
Creating Black wealth by transitioning companies with significant Black workforces (regardless of ownership demographics) to employee ownership
Helping Black-owned micro businesses grow so those that want to consider EO will be ready
Investing in long-term, high-touch development approaches for startup cooperatives

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Published March 2023

Two undeniable facts make employee ownership a viable solution for closing the racial wealth gap: the wealth gap in America — and Atlanta in particular — is widening and steady, low-wage employment is failing to make a difference. This study explores how traditional structures have contributed to the concentration of wealth in the hands of a few, and how employee ownership can help to democratize the economy and empower Black workers to build wealth and economic stability. Through a combination of case studies and analysis of existing research, Dr. Cynthia Hewitt, Ph.D. of Morehouse College, and Kyle K. Moore, Ph.D. of The New School, make a compelling case for the adoption of employee ownership models as a means of achieving greater economic equity and opportunity for Black workers.

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Events & webinars

In this video, Project Equity CEO, Evan Edwards, is joined by Dr. Cynthia Hewitt, Ph.D. and Terron Ferguson, from Morehouse College for a virtual discussion of the partnership and the papers.