Editing Cooperative (section)

=== Wages ===
In 2021, Hanson and Purushinkaya performed a survey on working conditions of cooperatives in the US,<ref name=":0"/> in which cooperativists expressed that they were making wages above the minimum for good living conditions. According to the report, they received, on average, $3.52 /hour more than at their previous job.

Research shows that, in the US, the 77% of the cooperatives have a 1:1 or 2:1 [[Wage ratio|top-to-bottom pay ratio]], whereas the average large corporation in the US has a CEO-to-worker pay ratio of 303:1.<ref name=":0"/> This means that in worker's cooperatives there is much more distribution of wealth between the members of the cooperatives, which means that workers that are at the bottom of the organizational pyramid make more money than workers that are at the bottom of the pyramid but that are in conventional firms.

Research also shows that the effect of output price changes on wage variations is positive for both conventional firms (CF) and cooperatives (WC), but larger in WCs than in CFs.<ref name=":1">{{Cite journal |last1=Burdín |first1=Gabriel |last2=Dean |first2=Andrés |date=1 December 2009 |title=New evidence on wages and employment in worker cooperatives compared with capitalist firms |url=https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0147596709000560 |journal=Journal of Comparative Economics |language=en |volume=37 |issue=4 |pages=517–533 |doi=10.1016/j.jce.2009.08.001 |issn=0147-5967}}</ref> This means that, because the distribution of wealth is much greater in WCs, an increase in the benefits of a WC usually is reflected in a proportional increase in the wages, whereas in CF this increase in the wages is much smaller (since the wealth is accumulated by people in the higher position, or is saved for new corporate investments).

However, the fact that the wealth is distributed between the already hired workers has the downside of preventing the cooperatives of hiring more workers, thus having a rate of creation of new jobs that is lower than CF. However, in WC changes on output prices does not translate in more employment, whereas in CF it does (CF create less employment).<ref name=":1" />

Research shows that in times of crisis, employment and wages are more protected in WC than in conventional firms;<ref name=":1" /> since the focus of WCs is on protecting employment and because the workers that control the WC do not want to lose their jobs, WC are generally more willing to protect them. This does not happen so much in CF, where the focus is on maintaining the margin of benefits and not employment, which is considered a cost in times of crisis.

Research also shows that the difference of wages between workers hired by the cooperative and workers that are members of the cooperative is small (a worker can work for the cooperative but not be a member of it).<ref name=":1" /> Two explanations have been proposed: the first one is that the spirit of cooperativism also extends to hired workers; and the second that sometimes employees are needed for highly skilled jobs, which provides them with strong bargaining power enabling them to defend their employment positions and to compensate for their lack of formal control rights over the firm.<ref name=":1" />