EARLY COOPERATIVE SURVIVAL: THE LIABILITY OF ADOLESCENCE

The paper explores the pattern of early closure risks for worker cooperatives, whether this pattern involves a “liability of newness” or a “liability of adolescence” and whether it applies identically to coops created from scratch, to rescues of failing firms and to conversions from sound conventional businesses to the cooperative form. Non-parametric hazard curves are estimated using data on the 2,740 worker cooperatives created in France in 1977–1993, 1,660 of which exited during the period. Comparisons are drawn with conventional French firms whenever data for the same cohorts are available.