Bank of America, Citigroup, Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan Chase have just abandoned the Net Zero Banking Alliance. While it seems to be yet another dire omen for so-called environment, social and corporate governance (ESG) investing, it would be premature for people on the Right to imagine that the Left’s lock on the finance industry is ending.
ESG investing is notionally the idea that investors should consider the eponymous non-financial factors of ESG in making finance and investment decisions. The biggest part of “ESG” investing is the “E” (environment) and the biggest part of the “E” is climate and the dubious goal of “net zero emissions,” which I have previously written about here and here.
The phenomenon of ESG investing started out in the 1960s as “socially responsible investing” (SRI) investing, was rebranded as “corporate social…