Earlier this month, Generation Investment Management, a firm I co-founded along with David Blood, released a white paper on the importance of sustainable capitalism. The white paper defines Sustainable Capitalism as a framework that seeks to maximize long-term economic value creation by reforming markets to address the real needs of all stakeholders while considering all costs. The challenges facing the planet today are unprecedented and extraordinary; climate change, water scarcity, poverty, growing inequality of income and wealth, demographic shifts, and a global economy in a state of constant dramatic volatility and flux, to name but a few.
While governments and civil society will need to be part of the solution to these challenges, ultimately it will be companies and investors that will mobilize the capital needed to overcome them. We hope that the white paper helps to re-energize the discourse around Sustainable Capitalism, and informs a discussion around the concrete steps that will be required to achieve real change by 2015.
The white paper presents five key actions for immediate adoption, which have the potential to accelerate the transition towards Sustainable Capitalism
If you'd like to read the white paper from Generation, see below.
Cross-posted from Al's Journal.
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I would say Al gore is sustained by a never ending ocean of oil, gas and coal as he lives his NON-ascetic lifestyle.
Of course, it totally ruins the lump of coal, but they do it in the Midwest anyway. It's crazy.
If we did this, we would discover approximately $400bill of note liability on the FRB books that would go unclaimed! This much, or a similarly large amount, is just disappeared. And it is a wonderful secret. But what happens when the funny money days of the U.S. dollar as reserve currency are done? Sustainable? Hardly. The new world is not going to be run by us.
Sustainable Capitalism to work needs a system of rewards & punishments.
The best system I can imagine is a tariff or tax system base on the environmental impact selling a product. This system would examine the impact of manufacturing, transportation, sustainability of the products raw materials, and disposal or recycling environmental impact.
Products requiring excessive amounts of fossil fuels to manufacture would have a high tax or tariff while products with no fossil fuel demand for manufacturing would have no tariff or tax added to the cost of the product.
This rewards local manufacturing which is a good thing. It pushes us quickly to a sustainable economy and greatly reduces each individual environmental footprint.
Any system can be corroded by greed. It isn't inherently the system as much as it is the apathy of people who allow it to become corroded and thus, ineffective to the whole. Humanity, climate justice, sustainability and equality over the longterm both in the marketplace and in the hearts and minds of those of us who must live in the world we make by our own hand are now essential for our continued survival. I hope the change in perception we need to make this happen somes soon. Our earth needs us now. Thank you, Al for being so hopeful and active in bringing this about. Much love.
this means socialism and communism are also not the answer.
nor is greenwashing our technological advances as they still demand increased consumption on this economic model.
the planet can do a certain amount of adapting, healing and regenerating if we treat it in a way that encourages these outcomes, but that means that the externalities currently being foisted onto the planet (and onto workers, taxpayers and consumers) would need to be internalized and the real costs of products would need to be included in their prices.
so, companies could no longer pollute, exploit, strip, poison, denude or otherwise destroy our natural environment and would have to find ways to produce their goods without destruction. totally do-able, but more expensive (to the company) in the short term. that's when we start seeing that efficiency and non-deadly energy like rooftop PV are far far cheaper than all forms of Big Energy, that small and organic are far cheaper then Monsanto, that peace is far cheaper than war, and that sustainability (and repurposing and recycling) are far cheaper than manufacturing from raw materials, etc.
"investors" don't want that system, of course, because that means they can't get something for nothing (and socialize all the costs of their investments while privatizing all the profits), so it's time we reconsider how much power they have in our economy...
No one will be happy, untill politicians work for votes and not, dollars.
Everyone must work together to eliminate the legal bribery in Washington and only then can we can we begin to address all of our problems.
Even this valid issue does nothing more than waste our time untill,
our votes have more value than their dollars.
there is a general vagueness that blurs what you are trying to communicate:
" that will mobilize the capital needed"
The capital needed, eh? What, pray tell, is capital in this sense? Is it the working capital that is cash to make payrolls and pay the rent? Is it the hard equipment that is capital asset in the depreciable sense? Is it the net worth of a balance sheet which is the book value of the shares outstanding? Or.... is it the political capital of a devious George which seems to translate to popularity vis-a-vis an opponent?
Capital the nondescript power word of generalization that puts the crowd to sleep. Wake up.... speak to an audience.
http://esa.un.org/unpd/wpp/Documentation/pdf/WPP2010_Highlights.pdf