Montana Eyes Growth in Employee Stock Ownership Plans for Stability

Employee Stock Ownership Plans (ESOPs) remain an underutilized tool for enhancing retirement security and empowering workers.

Eva Villasana, a training specialist at Pacific Steel & Recycling in Great Falls, Montana, illustrates how ESOPs foster employee ownership and continuous improvement. Her journey from retail management to an ESOP company illustrates how these plans can influence workplace culture and may help improve retirement prospects, in the context of the median $955 retirement savings for working-age Americans.

Pacific Steel & Recycling adopted a Continuous Improvement Activity program inspired by New Hampshire’s Hypertherm, resulting in over 2,200 implemented ideas that drive operational gains. With fewer than 6,500 ESOPs nationwide and only 34 in Montana, these plans are still a niche approach despite evidence that ESOP companies are six times less likely to lay off employees. Nearly 100 organizations now participate in the Expanding ESOPs coalition, which works to grow employee ownership.

Eva Villasana is actively promoting ESOP expansion through this coalition, aiming to increase employee ownership in Montana and beyond, especially around Labor Day.

Given Montana’s distinctive economic conditions and workforce dynamics, expanding ESOPs here could reinforce community stability and employee commitment, potentially mitigating risks of layoffs while addressing retirement insecurity in local industries.

The opportunity too many Americans have never heard of
By Eva Villasana, Daily Montanan