Cooperatives pack a powerful economic punch that often flies beneath the radar screen.
That's the conclusion of a University of Wisconsin study which concluded that the country's 29,284 cooperatives have revenues of more than $654 billion and provide jobs for more than 2 million people.
The study, which was funded by the U.S. Department of Agriculture and surveyed 16,151 cooperatives, found that the cooperatives generated $133 billion in income and paid more than $75 billion in wages.
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The report found that the country's 8,344 credit unions have assets of more than $761 billion, employ 236,000 people and have $91.5 million members.
"Although cooperative businesses have been responsible for many market innovations and corrections of market imperfections, little is known about their impact as an economic sector," the report concluded.
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