Browning chief. [volume] (Browning, Mont.) 1941-1953, 1947-07-04
LOOKING
! AAE4D
By GEORGE S. BENSON
h Pfesideni--HardiHs college
Searry. ArkaAsas
Who Owns Business?

"Who owns American corpora
tions?" That was the lead sentence
of an Associated Press story re-
leased the other day. Point of this
story was that the people own bust
ness. Stockholders of five big CON-
panies in representative fields add
ed together number 1854 1868, or
enough people to make the fourth
largest city of the United States.
That is correct, the people do own
our corporations. 1t is right for
people to own our business.
I have often commended that in
America you have the people own
ing the wealth and resources of
nation in much more direct and
complete manner than you could
ever have under any of the social
istic dream Utopias. This is the
straight answer to the Communistic
dodge that the people are the state
to which must be added the fact
that in totalitarian countries the
state owns the people. In America
the people, in very real way, own
the wealth and resources of the ma
ton.
"Vested" Interests
If you were to combine the popu-
lation of Nevada, Wyoming and
Delaware, according to the Associ-
ated Press story, you would still
not have as many people as own
the American Telephone and Tele-
graph Company. A city composed
of the 100000 A.T.&T. stockholders
would be the tenth largest in the
country. Moreover. it is significant
that this corporations stockholders
far outranls in number its 10000
workers.
This is generally true of American
corporations, and when you add
the stockholders to the employees,
you strengthen your picture of
America as place where the
masses have vested" interests in
the wealth of the nation. The stock
holders of the richest railroad in
the land, the Pennsylvania, outnum-
Der the employees almost four to
three. They live in every state Of
the union, and on the average own
60 shares representing an individual
investment of 81 200.
We're All Dependent
We think of General Motors, big
gest automobile manufacturers. as
having a lot of employees. Yet,
except for a brief period at the peak
of armament work during the war,
General Motors stockholders have
outnumbered employees for II
years. More than third of Gen.
eral Motors individual stockholders
have holdings OF 10 shares or few
er. No single person owns more
than is per cent of all General Mo-
tors stock.
While it is remembered that
sometimes large blocks of stock will
be owned by other companies, it
| must be kept in mind that these
companies in turn have many
| stockholders. Notable also is the
fact that many educational, chari-
table, and religious institutions, as
well as non-profit associations and
foundations, are on the rolls of
big business. No one knows just
! how many persons may be depend
elt upon inc successful operations
of our corporations. In the truest
sense, all of us are, either directly
or indirectly.
Most of the nations wealth has
Its source in the enterprise of
carefully conducted business. Nat
ural resources must first feel the
hands of men at machines. I can
not imagine why any free Ameri-
can would wish to trade what we
have in this country for any part
of the vague economic systems that
have produced only failure. Not
only have these other systems
failed to produce real blessings for
their people in the form of higher
living standards, but they have
brought slavery instead of economic
freedom.