- Capitalism and Alternatives -

Debunking the Fairytale of Shareholders' Democracy

In Reply to: Harris is great, Manning too posted by Mike Sprout on October 24, 1997 at 19:38:48:

MS: Whose to say McDonalds' CEO takes home far more than he earns? Shareholders always have the option of removing management if they feel they arn't getting their moneys' worth. Interestingly, most of the shares of multinatioanl companies you people whine about are held by the pension funds of the working people you aim to protect from them.

Qx: Shareholders' democracy is even more of a joke than the political kind. In the omost recent year available, the richest 1% of households- about 2 million adults - owned 39% of the stock owned by individuals : the top 10%, over 81%. Even if that's shifted a little bit, thanks to the mutual fund boom, there's no changing the fact that the bottom 90% of the population has a smaller share (23%) of investable capital of all kinds to play with than the richest 1/2% (29%).So your inspired claim about the democratization of ownership through mutual funds is found wanting.

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