Like most small businesses, we are passionate about not only what we do, but also the impact we have in the world. Our goal is to make the lives of our clients better while always adhering to our core values of social justice and empowerment.
At Moxie Bookkeeping, we see money as a means to an end, not as an end in itself. Having money not only means having the capacity to live a comfortable life, it also means empowering us to support causes that we believe in. We want to solve problems, not contribute to them.
One of the ideas we support is the concept of Ethical Investing, also known as Socially Responsible Investing.
In a market-driven system, Ethical Investing is most readily defined as an investment strategy wherein an investor chooses what companies to invest in based on a personal code of ethics. When an individual pursues a strategy of Ethical investing, they put their money in support of industries making a positive impact, such as sustainable energy or inequalities in housing, while at the same time expecting a financial return on that investment.
Ultimately it becomes a question of, is it possible to make a profit off of your values?
Rachel Robasciotti, founder and CEO of Adasina Social Capital, which works directly with social justice groups to craft its investment strategies, offers some further questions:
- What’s the issue you care about or want to have an impact on?
- How are you measuring that issue and your impact?
- And who are you working with to do that? What future are you investing in?
The problem with Ethical Investing is that it requires some individual due diligence.
“Most people are invested and have no idea what they’re invested in, because most people invest in mutual funds — which are these baskets of stocks — and they only tell you on the prospectus what are the top 10 holdings,” says Andy Behar, CEO of As You Sow, a nonprofit that promotes environmental and social corporate responsibility.
“You may hold companies that are profiting from burning down the rainforests, profiting from private prisons, profiting from climate destruction, and you have no idea. It’s very, very difficult to figure it out.”
And really, is there any ethical consumption under Capitalism?
Still, one way to try to invest ethically, or at least make you feel that you’re trying to do something positive, is through ESG investing.
ESG investing is a form of sustainable investing that considers environmental, social, and governance factors to judge an investment’s financial returns and its overall impact. An investment’s ESG score measures the sustainability of an investment in those specific categories. Although there is a good deal of “green-washing” in all sectors of the economy, with some effort on the part of the individual investor, there are some investments to be found that do live up to their promises.
The easiest way to try to move your money toward doing good (or at least not something terrible) is to take a look at your 401(k). If there’s an index fund with an ESG component in there and the potential social benefits outweigh the potential costs, consider choosing it.
It is up to you as an investor to do your research. You need to identify businesses that will make the world a better place if it succeeds, and it aligns with your ethics. Unfortunately, that’s more complicated than it sounds. For example, even if you think solar panels will make the world a better place, funding a solar panel company isn’t guaranteed to do it; if the company displaces other solar panel companies and does a worse job, then its success won’t have improved anything.
Ethical Investing is possible, though. We at Moxie Bookkeeping implore you to think about the world you want to live in and take action in all aspects of your life. This includes not only how you run your business, but also how you invest your money.
Do you have any ethical investment strategies you’d like to share with us?