According to a 1998 NBER paper by Morck, the Wallenberg family controls corporate assets equal to 40% of the market value of all corporations on the Swedish stock exchange.
Statistics Canada tells us that 25 enterprises in Canada control 41% of all corporate assets in the country. Ownership concentration is lower in the US, e.g., 85% of Standard and Poor corporations were widely held, while in Canada only 22% of TSE corporations were widely held (data from the late 1980s; widely held=ownership positions under 20%). The Morck paper (cited by Michael P. on Pen-L a couple of years ago) does an absurd regression between inherited wealth and variables like the level of public debt and social assistance in various countries, but the data they collect is generally consistent with a connection between ownership concentration and social democracy. Bill Burgess At 07:06 PM 15/01/02 -0500, you wrote: >Michael Perelman wrote: > >>Another Swedish question. Doesn't Sweden have one of the most >>concentrated industrial structures in the world? > >Yup, think it does. The Wallenberg family's Investor trust controls some >enormous portion of Swedish industry. Such structures are good for social >democracy; dispersed stockowner structures like the U.S.'s are its enemy. > >Doug
