Summary
This paper provides an overview of existing data on employee share ownership (ESO) in Australia. It is concerned with broad-based employee share ownership plans: plans in which the majority of employees within the company are eligible to participate. It begins by briefly outlining the key quantitative studies on ESO undertaken in Australia over the last decade. It then looks at the incidence of ESO; trends over time; the incidence of various types of ESO plans (ESOPs); awareness of ESO among business; characteristics of companies with ESO; characteristics of employees taking up shares; and attitudes of businesses towards employee share ownership. Finally, for comparative purposes, it provides data on the incidence of employee share ownership in North America, Europe and Asia. The conclusion identifies areas in which our knowledge of employee share ownership remains very limited.