It is as vital as land, factories or machines, but much harder to control.
Legal title is the magic wand that brings "dead" stocks -- of land, factories, businesses, machines -- to life.
It is a particularly straightforward way to hold disparate and worldwide assets—such as land, factories and investments—and transfer them to heirs or spouses, who can take a stake in the company.
But the question must be why any global business would opt for France or Britain to manufacture increasingly homogenised goods to be sold across the world, when Turkey will supply land, factories and a cheap skilled workforce tax-free.
The government says henceforth all disputes will be settled in local courts, which are widely perceived to be wholly under the thumb of the executive.That really comes down to Mr Chávez himself, who is prone to decree state takeovers of land, factories and other businesses with no prior notice, and with scant regard for the law or the constitution.
It can recognize farm land, factories, oil rigs, and much more.
For the whole of the industrial era, 200 years or so - and the agricultural millennia before it - power was vested in the people who owned the means of production: land, factories, machines, printing presses, transmitters.
Unalaska is now among the top fishing ports (particularly of walleye pollock [Theragra chalcogramma]) in the United States, with large fish-processing plants on land and factory ships offshore.
After graduation, students knew they could land a factory job, work for 30 years, then retire with a pension and benefits.
