I was thinking the other day about companies and the impetus behind patents. I agree we want Elon and Jobs and Bezos to have ownership and run the show, like they do now, and with as much “wealth” and power as they have, exclusively, for some amount of time. But I’m not sure if we want the mass of power they accrue to sit around indefinitely. Once the head leaves, as you saqy, the company is entirely different. Society does not really benefit from a scenario where say Jobs accrues tons of wealth doing great things and then leaves this zombie beast of a company lying around continuing to suck money out of people and transfer it to shareholders.

So I think something like a limited exclusive right to profits might work. You (a company) can profit no questions asked for say 14, extendable to 28, years if more time is needed and/or you’re still under a certain size. After that a company gets turned into a non profit. It may still operate and pay employees and staff and whatnot, but it may no longer pay owners out the wealth that it accrues. It either has to spend that wealth, pay taxes, or lower prices so that it’s not taxing people, essentially. Obviously this needs more ironing out but I think it is possibly a compromise that is radical enough to combat the large and dangerous wealth vacuuming machines that companies turn into while still preserving the incentives structure that drives capitalism.