Aligning Business And Values
A father of the social investment movement reflects on decades in the field, and the ongoing promise of changing the world through responsible financial choices.
by Wayne Silby, Calvert Foundation
Some 35 years ago, I co-founded Calvert Social Investment Fund, the nation’s first socially responsible mutual fund. To this day, people ask what inspired me to join what would soon evolve into the
MARGIN SHARE
Marginal Cost Inclusivity as a Possible Answer to Inequality?
Executive Summary
We introduce MARGINSHARE, a change in the economy that may substantially lift disposable incomes of approximately 60 million low wage workers in a self-sustaining manner. The
Actions taken on the BLM issue over the decades when I was Calvert chair. Walking the talk.
1. Calvert Social Investment Fund was the first mutual fund, and one of the first institutional investors, to divest from South Africa over its moral objections to apartheid. About 20 years later, Calvert sponsored the first venture fund to go into South Africa post-apartheid.
A Wall Street group asked me for some thoughts on investing with Compassion. I thought one angle that could be of interest to their readers is how having compassion can inform business opportunities. see article below
Too often when we talk about business ethics, compassion, and doing good, there is a “should” quality to the conversation that tugs on guilt and feelings of burdensome responsibility. I recommend against that framing of compassion. Better to ask yourself about your own values that speak to you that gives you the uplifting energy and the joy that can come from positive self-expression. Riding on this energy gives one the persistence needed to make things happen.
I want to thank the Neanderthals at the Department of Labor (DOL) who recently proposed a new rule that pensions funds can only invest with one view – financial returns – and cannot even consider the benefits of an investment to the broader stakeholder society. Gratifying to know that over 90% of the commentators of the proposed rule were against it, including leadership firms like BlackRock. I find it so amazing that the administration can be on the wrong side of history as Environmental, Social, and Governance (ESG) concerns become more widely accepted concerns in the investment process.
