Excluded Workers DC

ALT Beloved Community Incubator And our role in the Solidarity Economy Beloved Community Incubator (BCI) is a worker self-directed nonprofit that provides sliding-scale support for worker-owned cooperatives, collective projects, business owners, and freelancers in the Washington, DC metro region. BCI supports workers in the DC-area to build and maintain worker cooperatives, especially cooperatives led by poor and working class Black and Brown workers, as a strategy for building political and economic power in the DC-area that centers poor and working class Black and Brown communities.

ALT Worker Cooperatives Worker cooperatives are an example of a solidarity economy institution in which the workers own and control the business collectively. Within worker cooperatives, workers control their own schedules and workplace conditions, determine their own wages and control the surplus, or profits, of the business. With ownership in the hands of workers, cooperatives stay connected and accountable to their communities, and worker-owners can choose to reinvest money locally. More than half of worker cooperatives in the United States today were created to improve low-wage jobs and build wealth in communities most directly affected by inequality, helping vulnerable workers build skills and earning potential, household income and assets. Jobs at cooperatively-owned businesses tend to be longer-term, offer extensive skills training, and provide better wages than similar jobs in conventional companies.

ALT Coops and the Solidarity Economy An introduction to Beloved Community Incubator's work What is the Solidarity Economy? The Solidarity Economy is a global movement to build a just and sustainable economy where we prioritize people and the planet over endless profit and growth. Growing out of social movements in Latin America and the Global South, the solidarity economy provides real alternatives to capitalism, where communities govern themselves through participatory democracy, cooperative and public ownership, and a culture of solidarity and respect for the earth (New Economy Coalition). Building blocks of solidarity economies include: Cooperative businesses owned by workers or the community, limited equity housing cooperatives, community land trusts, credit unions, public banks, community supported agriculture programs, and other institutions through which we can collectively own and control land, money and our labor.

ALT Kahssay, a leader of the the decrim street vending campaign, needs support paying his bills! Kahssay sold hot dogs and half smokes downtown for more than 30 years but he hasn't been able to work since the start of the pandemic. He needs help to renew his license under the new law so he can support his family! Share and chip in if you can Venmo or CashApp: @yomictin