More than 14 million workers at over 6,700 American companies own part or all of their employers through an employee stock ownership plan (ESOP) but there’s not much discussion about it “in the business section of the newspaper or in public policy discussions about how to address economic opportunity” according to Business Insider.

For those interested, a new research report from the nonprofit National Center for Employee Ownership offers some useful insights into how employees are affected by being employee-owners instead of just workers. Namely, employee-owners are more likely than other workers to rise toward the middle class.

The study, which reviewed data on workers aged 28–34 from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, indicates that employee-owners had 92 percent greater median household net worth than nonemployee-owners; 33 percent higher income from wages; more job security (53 percent longer tenure at their current jobs); and strikingly better employee benefits.