Mr Owens prattles on and on about "institutional ownership," but the reality is that most individual holders of stock don't even hold it in their own name anymore - they hold it in street name. My AMR is held by a unit of Vanguard - the discount brokerage division. That means that my name doesn't appear on any AMR records as a shareholder; Vanguard's name does.
Then Vanguard votes for you, and you have no say in how they vote.
Most of the "Institutional ownership" is through "Funds" run by those Institutions. When you put your money into those funds you only have a say as far as leaving it with them or taking it out.
The shares that are held in these Funds by these Institutions are controlled by these Institutions, not the individuals who invested money into the Fund. When it comes time to vote the Institution does the voting, since the stock is in their name. The investors in these funds put their money into the fund, not any individual stock so they do not really become "owners" of any company at all. Not even the company that controls the fund!
In other words they own nothing , only the right to share in any increased value or loss of the fund run by the Institution. Its more like betting than owning, if you bet on the Mets and they win, you win, if they lose you lose but you still have no say in who or how the team is managed.
The idea that we are becoming an "ownership society" is false, in fact the few at the top are gaining more control than ever. With the growth of "funds" driven by the forced participation of the general public, I say forced because of the demise of pensions, Social Security and our lack of "stock market savy", more and more capital will be controled by unelected, unaccountable people. Sure we can move our money from fund to fund but no matter what fund we put our money into we still do not end up with collective control over any company, in fact we are becoming less relevant than ever before.
