In the context of the current conversation about values and making conscious decisions based on them, prompted by tomorrow’s eclipse, what do we make of a young man who decided to become an openly-traded IPO and sell shares of himself? Especially on the eve of a New Moon in Taurus that echoes his own natal New Moon in Taurus?
By Amanda Painter
What’s it like to live your life like it’s a live-action sci-fi novel?
Ask Mike Merrill — a young man who, in 2008, decided to put himself up for sale on the stock market. The idea is not entirely new — David Bowie and a few pro athletes have sold shares of their future earnings. But those investors were not granted the power to decide some of the most significant facets of anyone’s personal life.
Mike Merrill, however, has basically turned himself into a one-person corporation governed by his shareholders. In this age of Citizens United, this either makes perfect, bizarro-world sense, or it’s unnerving and possibly tragic in a classical, Greek-hubris sort of way.
However you see it, ultimately, his story is the story of Pluto in Capricorn.
Here are the basics: on January 26, 2008, then 30-year-old Mike divided himself into 100,000 shares to be sold on the open market, and over the course of a week and a half, a dozen friends bought 929 shares. Mike kept the remaining 99.1% of his shares, promising that he would not have voting power. Those who bought shares would earn returns on any profit he made outside of his day job in Portland, Oregon.
Merrill says he did not originally intend to give shareholders a say in his personal life. But at least one friend-shareholder objected to his decision to move in with his girlfriend — proposing that spending more time with her could limit time spent on projects important to investors. Merrill then opened much more of his life to their oversight.
“I figured they’d make good decisions for me, since they had money on the line and wanted to see their investment appreciate,” says Merrill.
Not surprisingly, Merrill’s girlfriend at the time felt differently — and she was infuriated and embarrassed when he decided to let shareholders vote on whether he should get a vasectomy. She won that vote by lobbying another investor for help. Ultimately, it wasn’t enough to save the relationship as McCormick felt more and more like she was jockeying for influence over a corporate entity in a hostile business environment — not engaging in an intimate relationship.