The Local Desk • Political Economy
Dividends for the shareholders
Every American already owns a share of the country. The question is whether that share ever pays a dividend.
Alaska answered it in 1976. Voters locked a portion of mineral royalties into a permanent fund. The fund invests. Eligible residents receive an annual check. In 2026 that payment is $1,200. The machinery is simple: public assets produce returns; citizens receive a portion of those returns as owners, not as clients of a program.
The case is not theoretical. It is written in the housing transfer that began in 2008.
