As an investor, you are buying ownership into a company and the rules are relatively simple – upon owning shares you can vote at the AGM, if the company makes a profit as a shareholder you can be paid dividends, but if the company does not do well, as a shareholder the debt is paid off first, then preferred shareholders and finally your shareholding. In the process there would likely be a vote to inform you of how much you are getting per share. The rules of ownership are defined and that helps ensures a steady stream of investors into buying shares. Have you ever thought about how ownership works in other areas of your life?

In a book called Mine! – How the Hidden Rules of Ownership Control Our Lives by Michael Heller and James Salzman, published by Doubleday, NY, 2021, the authors who are professors of law wrote about how ownership works. The reason you need to know or want to know about ownership is the rules change which creates winners and losers and there are always competing claims to scarce resources.

There are common maxims about what is mine. The most common are: first come, first served; possession is 9/10’s of the law; you reap what you sow; my home is my castle; our bodies, not our selves; and the meek shall inherit the earth.

The above are true, but are really only work when there is a binary view of ownership – we feel something is either mine or not mine. In an agrarian society most of the conflicts was about land.

In the 20th century, the most pressing ownership debates was between private and public control.

Presently the debates are shifting again, many of the pressing issues are concern the claims of one private owner against another – mine versus mine.

One example of the about is if you have flown lately, after the plane takes off, many people like to put their seat back for comfort. The first issue is how much should the seat go back and not interfere with the person behind you. Similar to most things on an airline, there are economics involved – the pitch used to be 35 inches airlines are shrinking that to 31 inches and some to 28 inches. For every inch of pitch saved per row can add up to 6 extra seats per flight to sell. To grow profits, airlines are squeezing more people into the plane.

The airline technically sells the seat which comes with space for your legs as well as selling the same space to the person in front of you to recline. What is the solution – most people fall back on politeness and good manners, but the reality is the control is the person with the button to recline.

When industries change, does ownership change and how does ownership change? For example, if you click on line to buy, when does the item change ownership to you? It turns out, there is an increasing gap between what we feel like we own and what we actually own.

When does ownership begin? The reality is all property conflicts exist as competing stories. Each side picks a story that presents its claims as the moral high ground and each side wants ownership bent towards its view. There is no better or worse choice, just a choice and if you are not the one choosing, then someone else is making the choice for you. Ownership rules pick winners and losers in every imaginable setting or there will always be conflict about ownership and either a regulatory body or court picking a winner.

As you look to 2024 and beyond and see companies that what to disrupt an industry, what they are attempting to do is change the rules on ownership, some you like, others you are not positive about, but the underlying strategy is to change ownership rules. If you read the book and consider ownership, often if you buy a company’s shares, you want the status quo, not change.

Linking to dividend paying stocks, when you buy these types of investments you know the rules of ownership and they are not changing. You buy the company shares because it makes a profit from the things it owns and has owned for years. There is little disagreement, what you company owns and sells to make a good margin and pay dividends.

There are more questions than answers, till the next time – to raising questions.