<i>&gt;It is a really interesting question why this is the case. Why should a business owned by a capitalist for their own benefit be able to outcompete a workers co-operative?</i><p>Because 99.9% of typical workers <i>don&#x27;t have the money</i> to build the business.<p>Take for example, Google Inc. origins in 1998.  Both L Page and S Brin came from upper middle class families but neither of their bank accounts nor their parents&#x27; bank accounts had $25 million to spend on a business.  It&#x27;s also doubtful if either family could have been approved for a $25m unsecured business loan from a bank.   Likewise, Google&#x27;s first 100 employeees also didn&#x27;t collectively have $25 million.  On the other hand, VCs like Sequioa and KPCB <i>did have $25 million</i> to invest.  Later on, more investors bought IPO shares totaling $1.9 billion.  There is no union of workers that can pool together that kind of cash.<p>Since a co-op by definition must be <i>owned by the workers</i>, the question is no longer &quot;interesting&quot; with a mysterious answer.  Instead, it&#x27;s tautological.  If you look at the typical workers&#x27; modest savings as the ceiling for funding a business, it&#x27;s obvious why they can&#x27;t compete with businesses built by investors&#x2F;capitalists money.  While WorkersOwnedSearchEngine Inc scrapes together $30,000 from their owners-workers&#x27; savings accounts to buy a 5th rack server from dell.com, Google Inc. can use a fraction of its $2 billion war chest to buy <i>an entire data center</i> and also break ground on a brand new one.