Johnny's Selected Seeds — if you've grown a vegetable garden or run a small farm, you know the catalog. What most people don't know: it's 100% employee-owned. The people who pack the seeds own the company.

WinCo Foods — if you shop the West, you know the warehouse-style grocery with the bulk bins and the prices that undercut everyone. Here's the part that doesn't make the ads: it's employee-owned.

REI — the co-op in the name isn't branding. Recreational Equipment, Inc. is a consumer cooperative: it's owned by its members, the people who pay a one-time fee and shop there, not by Wall Street shareholders.

In Burlington, Vermont, there's a way to own a home that can never be flipped for a windfall — and that's the point. The Champlain Housing Trust keeps about 3,000 homes permanently affordable by separating the house from the land under it.

In 1844, 28 weavers in Rochdale, England, each put in a few pounds and opened a tiny store. Broke, undercut by factory owners, tired of being cheated on weight and price. That store started something that now has a billion members.

Vanguard manages around $10 trillion and is owned by nobody on Wall Street. It's owned by its own funds — which means it's owned by the people who invest in it. No outside shareholders to pay.

Nebraska is the only state in America where every electric utility is publicly owned. No investor-owned power company operates there at all. 1.8 million people, zero shareholders to pay.

Vienna is a city of 2 million where about 60% of people live in housing the city built or backs. Not projects for the poor — the mayor's neighbors live there. Rent runs about a quarter of income, and it's capped.

When men retire, a lot of them quietly come apart. The job was the social life. It ends, the friendships thin out, and the depression often shows up before they have a word for it.

The Green Bay Packers are owned by 538,967 people. No billionaire owner. The shares pay no dividend, can't be resold for a profit, and never rise in value. That's the design, not a flaw.

REI's 22 million members own the company—not lenders, not executives. Buy a $30 lifetime share, collect dividends every year. The same market pressure as any retailer, but the scoreboard says *build* instead of *extract*.

Once you know five neighbors by name, something shifts. You stop buying things you could borrow. Not because you're frugal — because asking Tom for a ladder feels normal now. Before you knew his name it would've felt weird. After one conversation it feels obvious. The barrier was never the stuff. It

If your state had a public bank like North Dakota's, your tax dollars would sit in a bank that lends them back to your community — not one that ships them to Wall Street. North Dakota uses its bank to fund small business loans, student loans, and emergency farm lending at rates private banks won't t

In 1902, 100,000 coal miners went on strike in Pennsylvania. The mine owners refused to negotiate. Previous presidents sent the Army to break strikes. Theodore Roosevelt — a Republican — threatened to seize the mines and run them for the public. The owners agreed to arbitration within days.

Most cooperatives fail for the same reason. Not bad management. Not lack of demand. They can't get funding. The entire financial system — banks, VCs, angels — is designed for businesses with owners who take profit. A company owned by its workers doesn't fit the form.

Mondragon’s 81,000 worker-owners elect managers, share €12.7B in annual revenue, and reinvest profits across their network. One Worker, One Vote has sustained cooperatives in manufacturing, finance, and education since 1956.

The fastest way to move people in a city isn’t more lanes. It’s moving the lane—literally. In Seoul, removing a 1.3km expressway from Cheonggyecheon increased average traffic speeds by 10% within six months.

In 2001, ten software engineers in A Coruña, Spain started a company with no CEO, no managers, and one rule: everyone is paid the same. 24 years later, Igalia has 142 engineers across 20 countries. They've never hired a boss or taken a dollar of outside funding.

In 1965, CEOs made 21 times what their workers made. By 2023 it was 290 times. The job didn't get 290 times harder.

In 1965, CEOs made 20 times what their workers made. Today it's 348 times. The workers didn't get 348 times less productive.

Over 800 tool libraries across North America, run by volunteers in partnership with local governments, report saving members an average of $20,000 per year.

Mondragon Corporation employs over 80,000 worker-owners across 250+ cooperatives, paying €2.2B in wages in 2022. 85% of profits are reinvested in the network, not extracted.

The pattern is the same everywhere. Take something people need. Make the system complicated. Profit from the confusion.

One in five American households have medical debt in collections. Total: $140 billion. Not from buying things they didn't need. From getting sick.

There's a company in Spain with 81,000 employees and €12 billion in revenue. The highest paid person makes about 6 times the lowest paid. In the US the average CEO-to-worker ratio is 300 to 1.

Thailand’s Universal Coverage Scheme cut uninsured rates from 28% to near zero by 2002. The shift from fee-for-service to capitation didn’t just change payment models—it rewired incentives to keep people healthy, not treat them after failure.

New Zealand replaced GDP with a Wellbeing Budget in 2019, prioritizing mental health, child poverty, and indigenous outcomes. The 2020 budget allocated NZ$1.9 billion to improve child wellbeing, while GDP growth remained a byproduct metric.

In Chicago, life expectancy is 69 in Englewood and 90 in Streeterville. 8 miles apart. Someone will say genetics. Here's what's actually different.

Someone said genetics determines how long you live. In Chicago, life expectancy is 69 in Englewood and 90 in Streeterville. Same city. 21 years apart. Genetics didn't change in 8 miles.

Costa Rica’s infant mortality rate dropped from 15.6 per 1,000 live births in 1980 to 7.8 in 2000 after EBAIS teams deployed one per 4,000 residents, covering rural areas missed by urban hospitals.