first of all, whether or not a company "creates value for society" is a red herring. it doesn't matter to an individual looking for an investment vehicle.

> To an average small investor, shares in almost every company might as well be Magic cards. Their only value is to sell them later to a different collector

this is true to the extent that thinking of stocks this way probably wouldn't hurt you as a small investor, but it obscures the reason why stocks have value and are different from bonds. when you buy a stock, you are locking in a fraction of future real productivity, whether or not you can derive cashflow from it directly. with a bond, you are locking in a nominal return, which could result in a real loss over time. although stocks have significantly outperformed bonds historically, I would hesitate to say that one is inherently better than the other; they just carry different risks.

as an aside, I'm really not sure why non-voting shares that don't pay dividends are valuable, but AFAIK, these are not as common as nrclark suggests.