Rick Dahms
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A year ago, a woman I was dating asked if I could ever live in a smaller house. I don't own a huge house by Seattle standards, but at 2,700 square feet, it's certainly bigger than I need. "If I had your wealth," she said, "I'd give it away."
Owning my home gives me a sense of safety that I lacked as a child. Being able to spend what I want without having to balance a checkbook at the end of every month helps me feel independent and secure.
But to her, interdependence with community—living with awareness of our reliance on others—was an important value. It was a turning point for me in my relationship with money. I could no longer ignore the fact that wealth was an emotional crutch for me, a kind of security blanket.
I'd become wealthy at Microsoft. After eight years with the company, I left with about $5 million. What other baggage might I be carrying?
I had known for some time that the investments I'd been making with my windfall were supporting corporations whose harmful practices conflicted with my values. Why would I allow my investments to operate with a different set of values than I demand of family, friends, and colleagues? Why is it acceptable for me to buy from and invest in corporations that exploit and harm people?
I began a journey to discover what my money was doing and how I could become a more thoughtful consumer and investor. Along the way, I spoke with community leaders, investment advisers, and people with less, little, and no savings.
I wanted to see if I could align my money with the kind of change I'd like to see in the world.
If I gave away my wealth, how would I meet my basic needs? Would it help others meet their basic needs? How does the structure of our society have an impact on my sense of security and my desire for investment profit? Why do I need more money?
"Our society is set up to isolate people with class privilege so they don't have to be confronted with those questions," says consultant Alison Goldberg of Resource Generation, a nonprofit that helps wealthy young people effect social change. "Classism insulates people with wealth from seeing how the unequal distribution of resources impacts others."
I thought it would be fairly simple to find responsible corporations to invest in, but it turned out not to be.
In fact, if you're one of the 95 million Americans who own mutual fund shares, you might be surprised to learn that you own corporations such as Halliburton, Wal-Mart, Exxon-Mobil, Altria (formerly Philip Morris), Dow Chemical, Nike, Coca-Cola, News Corp., and Microsoft.
It turns out that no matter how thoughtfully we invest our money, we're going to have to do something about the fact that corporations have more power than people do.
But you don't need to be a millionaire to have an effect. I'll show you how to use what you have in meaningful ways. Then I'll walk you through what I'm going to do with my own money.
The Corporation
The everyday choices we make with our money have a powerful cumulative impact. After 9/11, President Bush asked us to do our part in the War on Terror by shopping. In 2003, American corporations spent more than $245 billion marketing to us. Only the most starry-eyed idealist can say that America is a country governed by the people, for the people. In 2003, the Los Angeles Times called Bush's half-trillion-dollar Medicare bill "a sweetheart deal for the drug companies that represents a gigantic rip-off of our nation's taxpayers." That same month, the San Francisco Examiner reported that Bush's energy bill was so pork-laden, Republican Sen. John McCain of Arizona called it the "No Lobbyist Left Behind Act of 2003."
The Bush presidency has been very good for corporations, especially those that benefit from war and deregulation. The Vice Fund, a mutual fund that invests in such companies, has risen 73 percent in value over the past two years. The $250 billion spent in Iraq has helped double Halliburton's stock price.
Last November, the Los Angeles Times reported an epidemic of 50,000 young children sickened by ingesting rat poison after the Bush administration removed two safety requirements for manufacturers: an ingredient that makes the poison taste bitter and a dye to make it more obvious when it's ingested. The Washington Post reported that the Natural Resources Defense Council has documents "showing that Bush's EPA not only worked hand in hand with the industry, but also complied when manufacturers wanted the risks associated with rat poison downplayed in EPA assessments."
Matt Patsky, portfolio director of Winslow Management Co., a "green" investing firm, recently told the environmental magazine Grist that " . . . for the first time ever, over the last two years . . . the best performing stocks in the S&P 500 were the companies that have been the most flagrant environmental polluters. . . . Investors are starting to believe there is no liability: that the EPA is ineffective, that there is no enforcement, and that polluters will never have to pay the piper."
For the past century, we've allowed corporations to make the rules that are used to make the rules. Few of us understand the true meaning of the self-governance that our founding fathers killed for. Today, harmful corporate activities are perfectly legal.
