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Forum Post: Cooperatives: A potential solution to this mess

Posted 12 years ago on Nov. 11, 2011, 6:32 p.m. EST by AMH (123)
This content is user submitted and not an official statement

If we bring down the current elites, they'll just be replaced by new ones, because they're just a symptom, not the root of the problem. The root cause is the system itself. Why not change the system and cure the disease? What if everybody owned the corporations instead, of just a few?

It's called a cooperative corporation, and it's a legitimate and viable solution that has been proven in the marketplace. (Check out http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Co-operative_Group, for starters.) Cooperatives serve the people, not a handful of obscure shareholders. With enough large cooperatives, the dividends could provide a financial safety net for the people. At the very least, they would reduce or eliminate the accumulation of wealth in a few greedy hands.

We need to pool our resources and start more cooperatives. We need to grow them, too. Maybe if we push hard enough, we can purchase some profitable businesses. Then we can take the money those businesses earn and use it to purchase even more profitable businesses. Then we never let them go back to being owned by individuals. To make more money than someone else, a person will have to earn it, instead of sitting back & collecting a check because they were lucky & started out with more. Anybody can join, and we will work as a group to gain back and hold the ground we thoughtlessly allowed to be taken from us. This is capitalism the way it was meant to work. This is the economic revolution.

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[-] 2 points by AFarewellToKings (1486) 12 years ago

Lots of great ideas out there but putting the cart before the horse doesn't get us anywhere. Q: What's the prime mover of this cart? A:

[-] 1 points by stacych (1) 12 years ago

I was glad to see this post!

2012 is the International Year of the Co-operative ... and many see co-ops as an answer to the questions raised by the #Occupy movement.

Here is a Canadian economist's take on the option: http://rabble.ca/blogs/bloggers/progressive-economics-forum/2011/10/occupation-democracy-and-co-ops

In Canada, two studies have show that business start ups using the co-op model have a higher success rate than conventional businesses. See the study from BC here: http://www.bcca.coop/sites/bcca.coop/files/BALTA_A11_report_BC.pdf

Co-ops are a large part of the Canadian Economy--worth trillions.