State and Federal Legislative and Executive Action Opportunities

Summary

Primary Public Policy Benefit – Brief Summary

Public policy makers have a vital stake in fostering a healthy relationship between productivity gains and personal income, and more generally, in reducing income inequality and the concentration of power it often represents. In the midst of an increasingly centralized and unequal online economy, platform cooperatives (PCs) are online businesses that share ownership, governance, and profits far more equitably among users and workers. They are also a powerful new way to address growing concerns about data privacy, cybersecurity, and the inappropriate use of secret algorithms. PCs are building a new digital public square, one where the benefits of modern Internet technologies support jobs and economic growth without the dangerous centralization of power that threatens democracy and the common good. Policy makers can support the fast-growing Platform Cooperative movement and ensure that the thriving online economy shares its benefits more equitably in local communities.