The Washington times., 1922-04-29
AGSSsPgSHAHHe BUSINESS AND FIJI AN e i#zE
MONEY-TRADE
Corporate Ownership.
National Management.
AS Socialist Sees It.
The Small Minority.
BY GEORGE w. HINMAN.

ownership and control enables a
class to monopolize the chief bene-
fits Of Industrial progress" says the
call for an annual convention Of
Socialists this week. Then, for a
remedy, comes this suggestion:
"The great industries must pass
out of the hands of small minority
Of the population into the hands OF
the nation"
Many persons not Socialists assent
to the first statement-not so many
to the second. In the two taken
taken together. we have the familiar
declaration of war on large stock
companies as the tools OF few
millionaires who use them to reap
great profits and rob the rest of US.
Now nobody would undertake TO
justify or vindicate all stock com
panies. Nor would anybody try To
prove the radical changes wholly
false. But there are some things
to be considered. especially just now.
Stock companies may be owned
by a class. Granted. But IL Is in the
United States an enormous class
so enormous that 1t entirely does
away with the idea of a few million
aire shareholders. For example, there
are only 16, 200 or 1900 men draw
ing millionaire incomes in the United
States, yet the Atchison Topeka and
Santa Fe railroad has some 10000
stockholders: the Pennsylvania 14l,'
500, all the railroads Of the United
States, between 10000 and 500. 900
The American Telephone and Tele
graph Company has 10000 stock
holders. an increase by the way OF
$1,000 in the last year. The Stee
Corporation has 1O7 900 stockholders
5000 of them employees of the com
pany. The Commonwealth Edison
Company, which Chicago would
hardly regard as an enterprise oi
the plain people. has $4,000. The
Public Utility corporations OF Hi
nois, altogether, are supposed tc
| have nearly 100000.
But there are Implications In thes'
| lists; millionaire investors repeat
| in the various stocks. That Is tht
| common reply. Yes. to a certain eX
! tent. But when one considers tha
barely third Of the men who draw
millionaire incomes really have
million or more actually away in Sc
! curities, one can see that the dupli
I cations and repetitlons fail utterl!
| to account for the vast total o
shareholders.
SO far as the monopoly OF business
| by a few millionaires is concerned
the stock companies are plainly no
what they are accused of being
! They may be owned by a class, bu
the class is not a small one. In fact
II is of huge proportions. 1t mum
bers not only hundreds OF thousands
but millions of American citizens
and II is growing larger all the time
Within limits. every one Of thes'
shareholders is a capitalist. For, a
| the German Socialist Bernstein
| says, "a share is not merely capital
| IL is capital in its most complet,
! form" This the $50, 900 TO 500 ,00I
railway shareholders have learned
| often to their sorrow. This the IS,
900 steel workers, who bought share
around 80 or less and hold then
around 100 or more, have learned 4
their satisfaction.
But after all, comes the reply, ever
| though they number millions. th'
shareholders are minority. a class
In a way. yes. Nobody in his sense
would dispute II. But probably th'
stock company is the best means ye
discovered for making that class
the largest possible and keeping tn,
! door wide open for recruits.