About publicly owned businesses

[Tarbicus]

Hi Tom,
That question is totally outside of my scope of knowledge, but as far as I know, the Dutch East India company was the world's first legal entity covering several investors/shareholders.

I think the actual real first incarnation of what can be called a modern 'legal entity' (corporation), was first created for the benefit of American Indians, but the whole legal concept was seized upon by lawyers for far different purposes.

For a good rundown of, especially the modern corporation: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corporation

An excellent and critical documentary on them: The Corporation