"The test of a first-rate intelligence is the ability to hold two opposing ideas in mind at the same time and still retain the ability to function." - F Scott Fitzgerald
The head of the UK's financial watchdog, Lord Turner, has said that much of the activities of the City of London were 'socially useless'.
Of course, this isn't quite true. The wealth created in the City and in banking filters down through those earning it and spending it. Most investment banks donate to charities, and encourage participation in charitable activities, like running voluntary schemes for people to mentor kids from local schools. Some banks even have schemes to match charitable donations. There is a bit going on. But is that amount proportionate to the profits being made by individuals and by the firms? Put that way, Lord Turner has a point.
Tax is an easy way for politicians to beat the banks with a stick, an easy way to get headlines. It goes in the government's coffers. It doesn't go down well with big earners, and there will always be another country that will welcome big earners with open arms and lower taxes. You get a business drain and a brain drain.
For banking to lose the reputation it's garnered in the last few months and years, it needs to engage in society. It has some of the brightest minds in the country, indeed in the world. They get educated, and then the banks train them, and let them loose to make profit. That's how it works.
Why not add another aspect to this?
Make social responsibility as big a part of banking and finance as profit, as serving our clients, as driving things forward. Or at least demand that an institution devotes a decent percentage of it's operation and it's profit to social responsibility. It would provide employees with a more rounded view of life, more than just their commute from a nice neighbourhood to the bank. It would be as big a challenge as the ones we face at work everyday. That way would face all of life, not just the bits we cherry pick. We put ourselves to work, not only for ourselves and our families, but everyone else as well. It would be one small shift in consciousness.
Why not increase the engagement with charitable organisations?
If the government wants it's pound of flesh from the banks, why not encourage them to set up up profit-making organisations aimed at social change? Let them loose with their business expertise, their talent. Why not get big business to do the job that governments should be doing, but have proved time after time they can't do, caught up in getting re-elected, in bureaucracy, in a good sound bite. Big businesses have been running the show for decades, not governments. But governments can steer them.
There's a middle ground between the point scoring, the veiled insults, the threat of taxation. Governments here and in the US have bailed out banks, indeed bailed out nations, but I've yet to see a politician or a bank leader talk of a new world or a way forward. Why? Because they are stuck in trying to do what is right for them and their people (which is both understandable and fine), but they could be thinking bigger and having a greater vision for their countries and their societies.
That's what we, as a planet, really need if we are to avoid the credit crunch happening again (like the dot com collapse, the property bubble or all those other market crashes). We all need to be pulling in the same direction.
Of course, this isn't quite true. The wealth created in the City and in banking filters down through those earning it and spending it. Most investment banks donate to charities, and encourage participation in charitable activities, like running voluntary schemes for people to mentor kids from local schools. Some banks even have schemes to match charitable donations. There is a bit going on. But is that amount proportionate to the profits being made by individuals and by the firms? Put that way, Lord Turner has a point.
Tax is an easy way for politicians to beat the banks with a stick, an easy way to get headlines. It goes in the government's coffers. It doesn't go down well with big earners, and there will always be another country that will welcome big earners with open arms and lower taxes. You get a business drain and a brain drain.
For banking to lose the reputation it's garnered in the last few months and years, it needs to engage in society. It has some of the brightest minds in the country, indeed in the world. They get educated, and then the banks train them, and let them loose to make profit. That's how it works.
Why not add another aspect to this?
Make social responsibility as big a part of banking and finance as profit, as serving our clients, as driving things forward. Or at least demand that an institution devotes a decent percentage of it's operation and it's profit to social responsibility. It would provide employees with a more rounded view of life, more than just their commute from a nice neighbourhood to the bank. It would be as big a challenge as the ones we face at work everyday. That way would face all of life, not just the bits we cherry pick. We put ourselves to work, not only for ourselves and our families, but everyone else as well. It would be one small shift in consciousness.
Why not increase the engagement with charitable organisations?
If the government wants it's pound of flesh from the banks, why not encourage them to set up up profit-making organisations aimed at social change? Let them loose with their business expertise, their talent. Why not get big business to do the job that governments should be doing, but have proved time after time they can't do, caught up in getting re-elected, in bureaucracy, in a good sound bite. Big businesses have been running the show for decades, not governments. But governments can steer them.
There's a middle ground between the point scoring, the veiled insults, the threat of taxation. Governments here and in the US have bailed out banks, indeed bailed out nations, but I've yet to see a politician or a bank leader talk of a new world or a way forward. Why? Because they are stuck in trying to do what is right for them and their people (which is both understandable and fine), but they could be thinking bigger and having a greater vision for their countries and their societies.
That's what we, as a planet, really need if we are to avoid the credit crunch happening again (like the dot com collapse, the property bubble or all those other market crashes). We all need to be pulling in the same direction.
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