Cooperative Model Precedents

International: Mondragon, Legacoop

Mondragon Cooperative Corporation is the largest worker cooperative in the world, with more than 80,000 employee-owners. It is headquartered in the Basque region of Spain, where it is one of the largest and more profitable firms in the country. It consists of an array of industrial and technical divisions with their own branded product lines, as well as a technical college and internal bank. Because its employees own Mondragon, the firm is highly resistant to flay-offs as a means of responding to market instability. Instead they invest heavily in advertising and research and development, and shift workers from less profitable divisions to more profitable ones. In the current recession the Mondragon workers voted to institute work-sharing programs with concomitant wage reductions rather than lay off workers.

Legacoop is the largest confederation of cooperatives in Italy and taken together one of the largest cooperative confederations in the world. It includes worker co-ops, housing co-ops, retail co-ops, and health co-ops.

Local: Wheatsville, Black Star, UFCU