[no subject]

["Dhr. Poutsma" <e.poutsma@mailbox.kun.nl>]

Dear Deb

First of all I wish you all good health and full participation in the vital
aspects of your life.

Sorry for this late answer on the PEPPER matrix but had a study trip to the
US and field trips in Europe(among other places visited also Kent State
University and Ohio Employee Ownership Center which I enjoyed very much).
About the PEPPER matrix. When Francine Van Den Bulcke and I did the PEPPER
II study we had to stick to this matrix which was developed in 1990 for the
first PEPPER report. Personally, however, I have some arguments against the
basic definitions of financial participation that were used for PEPPER and
doubts about the gathered data. There were some critics on PEPPER
especially from the German side since the categories more or less exclude
investments plans/saving schemes that do not solely invest employee savings
in their own company. Another argument is that especially cash based profit
sharing has nothing to do with participation in ownership. Since cog is
aiming at wider distribution of capital ownership you should skip the
category of CPS. Both arguments of course have important impacts on the
data. It will probably mean that German rating will be higher and France
rating will be lower. 
Further comments would be to include 
-a measure or estimate of the magnitude of the public stock market in
relation to total capital in a country, and the share owned by employees; 
-a division between employee ownership in public stock companies and in
private closely held (smaller; although in Germany they might be quite big)
companies (most figures are based on approved schemes and public stock
market data, which means that PEPPER underestimates the amount of employee
share ownership; and 
-a measure of real participation: the nature of voting rights.

I can inform you that I am finishing a report for the European Foundation
for the Improvement of Living and Working conditions which is more or less
an update of PEPPER II. As soon as the report is made available I could add
the newest developments and for instance the positions of both trade unions
and employers.

With kind regards


Erik Poutsma
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Dr. Erik Poutsma
University of Nijmegen
Nijmegen Business School
P.O. Box 9108
NL 6500 HK Nijmegen
Netherlands
Project Participation & Team-Entrepreneurship
Tel.+31 24 3615628
Fax +31 24 3611933
Home Tel/Fax +31 24 6778978
E-mail: e.poutsma@bw.kun.nl
Home E-mail: e.poutsma@mailbox.kun.nl