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Having companies be employee-owned (which is commonly referred to as a worker co-op) is absolutely a political topic -- implementing policies to allow more companies to become worker-owned was part of the UK Labour Party's manifesto in 2017. Just because something is political doesn't make it bad.

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What government policies are standing in the way of worker co-ops?

free market policies. Proper Co-ops are designed not to exploit workers, local resources or destroy communities in order to create profit therefore have a hard time competing with ruthless profit-oriented companies in most markets. Co-ops create social value and are beneficial to workers and society alike, but they need to be nurtured actively.

Co-ops are doing just fine in a free market. In fact, the average lifetime of a co-op today is longer than that of a traditional corporation.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooperative#Economic_stability

On the other hand, less free market - which is what you get when you allow monopolies and oligopolies to dominate it - is harmful to them, just like any other business that's not "big enough".

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