The Shareholder

He owns $400 worth of stock. He is technically a co-owner of the company. The company just laid off twelve thousand people. He found out from the news.

The proxy statement arrived in his email. Forty-seven pages. He is invited to vote on executive compensation, board nominees, and a shareholder proposal about climate risk disclosure. His $400 of ownership entitles him to a voice. His voice will be counted alongside the institutional investors who own 83% of the shares and have already decided how they’re voting.

He voted against the CEO’s compensation package. The CEO’s package passed with 91% approval. His vote was counted. It made no difference. The institution can now report that shareholders approved the compensation. The shareholders are the institution’s own investors, but the language doesn’t distinguish between the fund that owns $4 billion and the person who owns $400. Both are shareholders. Both approved.

The company tells him he’s an owner. The ownership means: he participates in the upside when the stock goes up and absorbs the loss when it goes down. He does not participate in decisions. He does not have access to the CEO. He does not know when the layoffs are coming. He finds out the same way everyone else does — from a notification on the phone he bought with money the company made by employing the twelve thousand people it just fired.

The shareholder meeting is held in a conference center. He could attend. He would need to fly there, take a day off work, and sit in a room where the votes are already counted. The meeting is a ceremony. The democracy is a structure. The structure is designed to produce the outcome the institution already decided.

He owns $400 of a company that doesn’t know he exists. That’s ownership.