There are times when the need for economic and political understanding requires direct, openly adverse comment: Reference to corporate management compensation as something set by stockholders or their directors is a bogus article of faith. To affirm this fiction, stockholders are invited each year to the annual meeting, which, indeed, resembles a religious rite. There is ceremonial expression and, with rare exception, no negative response. Infidels who urge action are set aside; the management position is routinely approved. The shareholders who previously suggested some social policy or environmental concern have their proposals printed with supporting argument. These are uniformly rejected by management. The only significant recent exception has been at the meetings of the highly intelligent, socially eccentric and financially successful Berkshire Hathaway, Inc. of Omaha, Nebraska. Proposals by its stockholders are frequently accepted; some have thought this by prearrangement with management. In any case, it represents a highly exceptional tolerance on the part of the corporation. No one should be in doubt: Shareholders – owners – and their alleged directors in any sizable enterprise are fully subordinate to the management. Though the impression of owner authority is offered, it does not, in fact, exist. An accepted fraud.
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