Source: mikemooney.com
As part of the run up to the G7 meeting this weekend in Biarritz France, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) has launched an initiative whereby some of the largest companies in the world will be pledging that they will tackle a mandate that not only takes shareholder profits into account but to spread the benefits of economic growth to tackle inequality.
Personally, I am not a big fan of vague proclamations to do good. Not to hark back to the gilded age as anything we should look back on with favor, but you could say there was a time when billionaires were happy just to get rich and not think they were more than businessmen. Now however, we seem to be in the midst of the billionaire and CEO social changer; the entrepreneur or corporate titan who also wants their place in political history, to make their mark in space or now, for social change.
The Self Interest Express
Of course, this isn’t because corporations like JP Morgan Chase and Danone suddenly have had a change of heart and realize that they could potentially be making the world they operate in more unequal and miserable for many people, it’s more in their own self interest to do so. Opinion pieces like those of Farhad Manjoo voice an increasingly popular opinion: that the system is stacked against the little guy and only the elites are progressing. Even hedge fund titan Ray Dalio agrees: if something isn’t done, the pitchforks will be coming out.
These CEO’s see the writing on the wall and they are hedging their bets. Right now the US has a right wing populist in the White House, which has been pretty darn good for business. The same will not likely be said if a left wing populist occupies that space in the next few years and many companies are already positioning themselves for such a scenario. If the election of Trump taught people anything, it’s that we shouldn’t be ruling out any surprises when it comes to politics.
Consumer tastes are changing as well. More people are demanding ethical products and services like fair trade coffee. More activists funds and sustainable funds are springing up to meet the demands of shareholders and consumers that want corporations to take a stand. CEO’s are starting to realize that the bottom line will also take a hit if their firm ends up on the wrong side of a bad PR move, even if it isn’t their own doing.
Keep Holding Your Breath
If you are waiting for the rich to save the middle class from the rich running away with it, you can keep dreaming. Only the workers themselves can get together and make a union, only the bottom half of households that own no stocks can make an effort to start investing for their future and only those that see the current tax system as unfair can go to the polls to change the people making the rules so they are more fair for everyone.
It’s great if CEO’s and billionaires want to make those things easier for the rest of us to do but as I discussed in my post The Psychology of Being Broke, the real revolution needs to also come in the form of personal responsibility.
I spent the last week with a friend who picked up sticks, moved overseas, and founded what is likely the only black owned coffee company in Colombia. If people like her let the idea that the cards are stacked against them prevail, she would have had an easy excuse to give up and chalk all the problems in the world up to someone else.
Yes there is discrimination, yes the tax system is unfair and yes many people have gotten rich or stayed rich by less than just means, but that doesn’t mean that each of us should just throw up our hands and give up. Slowly but surely, the fact that CEO’s are starting to act on this should show people that change is possible, but we can’t change the world without many of us changing ourselves.
Although incomes on paper have been flat for much of the middle class for the past 30 years, and many areas have seen economic stagnation, the internet and the phone in your hand offer possibilities that have essentially been impossible for most of human history. A great idea, a service or a blog may not be easily monetized initially but a positive attitude and persistence can change this in the long run.
Eric Thomas, one of my favorite motivational speakers, often discusses how he slowly began to push himself to change his own life. One of his sound bites I often replay to myself is when he discusses confronting our own problems rather than running from them proclaims “DEAL with it.” I can hear him saying this over and over again when I am avoiding my own personal problems. When you deal with a problem you can start to find the solution to that problem to overcome it, but how many of us run from our problems rather than dealing with them?
Something for Everyone
The internet has really become the do-it-yourself, self help Mecca. If you don’t like exercise there are videos on YouTube that can help motivate you, if you are bad with money, there are a ton of sites to teach you how to change your habits, if your relationship is going bad there are sites which give you tips on that or can point you to the right therapist. The hardest move for most people to make though is to actually seek these resources out, because that involves admitting to yourself you have a problem and that’s where the real revelation is needed.
Taking control of your own life and taking responsibility for where you are and where you want to go are powerful drivers that likely have propelled many of those same CEO’s into the positions they are in now. If we want inequality to change, yes, there are a number of policy changes that will need to be made and there may have to be some clamoring in the street, but many of us also need to stop expecting that someone else is going to do it for us or lacking the belief that we can do it ourselves. Before we expect CEO’s to change things for us, let’s see if we can change something within ourselves first.
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