Corporations have a huge influence on the life of every resident—this book offers a visionary but practical intend to offer every resident a say in how companies are run while also gaining some supplemental income. It lays out a definite approach that uses the systems of the private market to carry corporations responsible to the general public.

This would happen through the creation of what the authors call the General Fund, some sort of national, democratic, mega mutual fund. Every American over about Citizen Capitalism: How a Universal Fund Can Provide Impact and Income to All eighteen will be entitled to a share and would take part in directing its share voting choices. Corporations and wealthy individuals would donate shares, bonds, cash, or other resources to the finance just like they do to additional philanthropic ventures now. The fund would spend dividends to its citizen-shareholders that could grow as the finance grows.

The Universal Account is undoubtedly a big idea, but it can be eminently practical: it uses the various tools of capitalism, not government, to provide all citizens a primary influence on commercial actions. It might be a significant institutional trader beholden not to a small top notch group of stockholders pressing for short-term gain but to everyone. The fund would reward corporations that made sure their actions didn’t harm people, neighborhoods, and the environment, and it could enable them to invest in innovations that could take lots of months to pay off. Which is another reason companies would contribute to the finance—they could be free of the continuous pressure to increase their quarterly talk about price and would essentially be subsidized for carrying out good.

The authors demonstrate that our current economic rules force corporations to be shortsighted and even destructive because for some large investors, nothing matters but share price. The Common Fund was created to be a effective positive balancing force, making the world an improved place and america a better nation.