|
Press release
Annual
Survey of Employee Share Ownership in Europe in 2015
The
European Federation of Employee Share Ownership (EFES),
the voice of employee share ownership in Europe, released
the new "Annual Economic Survey of Employee Share
Ownership in European Countries" on March 3.
Assets
held by the 8 million employee shareholders in Europe
in 2015 were never so high before: 370 billion Euro
and more than 3% of the capital of all large European
companies in 2015. This is more than 45.000 € per
person.
Marc
Mathieu, Secretary General of the EFES said: "We
see that even through the European crisis, employee
share ownership is a formidable engine to share in
results and growth, - assets per person have more
than doubled since 2009."
However,
the imbalance has continued to widen between European
countries.
Some
European countries have chosen for stronger incentive
policies, promoting employee share ownership and long
term savings as an investment for the future. The
UK, Austria or Spain have to be mentioned in this
way. The UK and Austria chose to double the fiscal
incentives for employee share ownership, considering
it is a key element of recovery, and Spain introduced
a new law for employee-owned and participative companies.
Instead
of that, some other countries have chosen to reduce
public spending and to support household consumption,
while incentives for long term savings and for employee
share ownership were sacrificed (France, Greece, The
Netherlands, Denmark). Meanwhile, Germany maintained
its reluctance to promote employee share ownership.
The
number of employee shareholders in Europe stabilized
in 2015. However, the decrease was significant in
continental Europe since 2011 (-10% and -700.000 persons)
while at the same time, the number increased by 10%
in the UK (+200.000 persons).
While
assets held by European employees in shares of their
company increased spectacularly since 2009, these
growing assets are spread over a declining number
of employees in continental Europe. Austerity and
lower incentives have thus a clear consequence in
continental Europe: The democratization of employee
share ownership regresses, leading to wealth concentration
and higher inequalities.
|
