Public Benefit Corporations

The development of corporate social responsibility and social entrepreneurship has given rise to demand for a different kind of corporate form, the “public benefit corporation”. The public benefit corporation is a for-profit corporation established with a specific public purpose. The certificate of incorporation of a public benefit corporation requires that incorporators specify some public benefit against which the pecuniary interests of the corporation's business must be balanced. Public benefit corporations as a specifc form are a relatively new addition to corporate laws of states in response to a growing desire by promoters to have a corporate form that outwardly signals a credible commitment by managers to a more publicly-minded business.

Although the form is relatively new, there is very little in the public benefit form that could not also be accomplished using a regular corporation. For many years, non-profit corporations were nothing more than corporations in which the certificate of incorporation prohibited the board from making a profit for stockholders. In fact, the Green Bay Packers' certificate of incorporation prohibits stockholders from ever receiving a dividend and requires the board of the Packers to donate any profits the team might have to a community foundation. 

In recent years, there has been a proliferation of public benefit corporations. For example, Ello, a Delaware public benefit corporation (social networking site), specifies as its public benefit that it will not share the private information of its customers with third parties. Plum Organics, another Delaware public benefit corporation (a baby food manufacturer), specifies that its public benefit includes “the delivery of nourishing, organic food to the nation's little ones.” Finally, Kickstarter, PBC, a New York public benefit corporation, specifies a number of public benefits that it will be guided by. The certificates of incorporation for Kickstarter is available in the Appendix.