Apologies if this post doesn’t fit well here, this has a personal element but is ultimately a moral and political discussion.

Personal context:

I’ve lived with no/low income as a disabled person my whole adult life with no end in sight. I try to follow best personal finance practices to try and ensure my survival as I can’t simply look to make more money. As I understand it, the advice I’ve read would be to begin investing (commonly in equity ETFs) once you have saved enough of an emergency fund and are ready to put away assets for the long-term. Due to a unique situation, I might manage to save enough money to begin investing before I go back to living paycheck to paycheck.

Concerns:

A) Is it unethical? On one hand, I’d be investing into truly evil companies. On the other, there’s no ethical survival under captialism and my minuscule investment won’t make or break a megacorps’ ability to do evil shit. Taking a silent stand won’t have an impact and I may just be hurting my own personal finances in the process. In turn, that ironically may make it harder for me to safely save and spend money on things like community organizing.

B) Isn’t it contradictory and unsafe? Investing in equities means I’d be betting on continued “growth” for decades to come. This is the system I’d be working to dismantle and investing in it would be like I’m betting against myself. Considering the impending climate crisis and foreseeable global instability, investing in equities feels like more of a gamble and less of a sound financial decision, but I’m not sure what that means for how I should manage my finances.

  • Pudutr0ñ
    5·
    3 days ago

    No problem, and sure.

    The truth is I just have never really focused on making money that much. I like how it works but I’ve seen it poison a lot of people. I got into business school and then econ due to family pressure. With the exception of a long period of time where I struggled with mental health, I had a good education that allowed me to make ends meet pretty easily, at least on a basic level. Instead of saving, I put my money into a couple of failed ventures that didn’t do well for different reasons. Right now I’m trying to start a new business with the money I make off consulting.

    I don’t like passive income as a concept, and I wish to work at least a little bit for the rest of my life, so starting a company seems like the reasonable way of keeping my own freedom while making an income and staying ethical.

    Hope this answers your question.