A big reason for this trend, Rob says, is healthcare.

Uh, it is really a challenge to, to find affordable healthcare in our country right now as, you know, an individual or as a small employer.

A lot of our big employers are self-funded, uh, and have a little bit more of a ability to get a lower cost price by bargaining with these big administrators.

These small groups, these small employers, uh, don't have those same opportunities, but we're able to create them for them by connecting them with our health and welfare fund.

In fact, it just might be the future of labor.

Right now, there are several hundred worker-owned cooperatives in the United States that probably employ about six to eight thousand people.

Most of those folks don't have a union right now, but are certainly interested.

Uh, the United States Federation of Worker Cooperatives, which is the, the organization that a lot of these folks are members of, they just passed a resolution for union neutrality for their members, their cooperative members.