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Retirement funds for teachers and firefighters are caught in ESG crossfire
NBC News / Comcast ^ | March 26, 2023 | By Nidhi Sharma (D-NBC)

Posted on 03/26/2023 8:04:18 AM PDT by Oldeconomybuyer

A growing wave of public pension administrators, business groups and labor unions are sending a message to Republicans looking to curb so-called “woke” investing: our money, our choice.

Regulatory efforts to stop money from going to funds that consider environmental, social and governance issues, commonly known as ESG investing, have typically targeted big Wall Street asset managers. Now, public pensions are increasingly caught in the crosshairs and with them the retirement funds of teachers, librarians, firefighters and other public service employees.

But while opponents of the anti-ESG restrictions are getting louder, their dissent hasn’t yet stopped the tide.

ESG investing — a market forecast to hit $33.9 trillion globally, or more than one-fifth of all assets under management, by 2026 — remains loosely defined, and some proponents have resisted regulatory efforts to tighten criteria around what qualifies for the label. Nevertheless, many conservatives have decried the practice as part of an activist liberal agenda and are pushing to limit it.

At least seven red states have implemented or are considering regulations banning public entities from considering ESG factors when investing state resources, according to a Harvard University report. Eight states have advanced bills or directives that target companies or banks accused of boycotting investments in oil and gas or firearms.

Not all state pension funds have been fighting for the right to apply ESG principles. Vermont’s pension commission has raised concerns about Democratic efforts to compel the state’s roughly $6 billion in pension assets to divest from fossil fuels — a category that has seen strong returns after the war in Ukraine drove up energy costs last year.

The ESG battle has been bubbling up in Washington, too. On Thursday, the House failed to override President Joe Biden’s first veto, in which he blocked a bipartisan ...

(Excerpt) Read more at nbcnews.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Government; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: esg; fiduciary; marxism; pensions

1 posted on 03/26/2023 8:04:18 AM PDT by Oldeconomybuyer
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

Just another way for them to get their grubby hands on OTHER PEOPLE’S MONEY.

It’s all the rage now. GIBS-ME-DAT money!


2 posted on 03/26/2023 8:07:17 AM PDT by House Atreides (I’m now ULTRA-MAGA. -PRO-MAX)
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

Those funds were taken from the taxpayer to begin with. It’s an issue for all of us.


3 posted on 03/26/2023 8:17:50 AM PDT by ComputerGuy (Heavily-medicated for your protection)
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

once their investments lose big money this will change in a hurry


4 posted on 03/26/2023 8:22:05 AM PDT by bigbob
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To: Oldeconomybuyer
"..sending a message to Republicans looking to curb so-called “woke” investing:
our money, our choice."

From my research, esg investments tend to lose money:

On a one-year basis, 63% of global ESG products underperformed. This reflects the overall
underperformance of growth products, as 73% of these investments underperformed the index.
Jan 17, 2023

get woke, go broke, morons.

5 posted on 03/26/2023 8:27:47 AM PDT by chief lee runamok (Anti Socialist Derelict At Large)
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

“Our money, our choice,” until the pension investors mismanage the investment with ESG stocks and the taxpayers get stuck with bailing them out, because, heaven forbid, we can’t let anyone face the consequences of their actions.


6 posted on 03/26/2023 8:33:15 AM PDT by Savage Rider
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

I discovered last week that my retirement fund had investments in SVB. It was not a lot, only .03% of its investments. But, that makes me wonder where else those funds are invested and exactly at what level my benefits are at risk from the ESG nonsense. That sounds paranoid, but given the “wokeness” of every institution, I wouldn’t be surprised someday to suddenly learn the entire fund had just become insolvent.


7 posted on 03/26/2023 8:41:21 AM PDT by CFW (old and retired)
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

Good - maybe they’ll go broke and starve and municipalities will stop showering lavish pensions on useless unionoid trash.

Sick of seeing people driving AMGs because they sat their fat asses in a suburban firehouse for 20 years.


8 posted on 03/26/2023 9:36:03 AM PDT by AAABEST ( NY/DC/CA media/political/military industrial complex DELENDA EST)
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To: Oldeconomybuyer
some proponents have resisted regulatory efforts to tighten criteria around what qualifies for the label

How about forbidding any considerations that don't go directly to the fiduciary duty to maximize the investor's return.

9 posted on 03/26/2023 9:55:38 AM PDT by FoxInSocks ("Hope is not a course of action." — M. O'Neal, USMC)
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To: bigbob

"once their investments lose big money this will change in a hurry"

And in the history books it will be recorded that when it came time to put their own retirement
money where their flapping leftist mouths were the teachers unions were found lacking.....


10 posted on 03/26/2023 9:58:47 AM PDT by Iron Munro ( Michael Byrd: "Well, Somebody had to do it - Babbitt wasn't gonna' shoot herself!")
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

What unions worry? Joe’s got their back.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/biden-bails-out-the-teamsters-union-bailout-pensions-36-billion-covid-rochelle-walensky-11670535657


11 posted on 03/26/2023 10:18:18 AM PDT by shoff (Vote Democrat it beats thinking!)
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To: FoxInSocks

Ping! Beat me to it.


12 posted on 03/26/2023 10:29:41 AM PDT by Rowdyone (Vigilence)
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To: Oldeconomybuyer
Retirement funds for teachers and firefighters are caught in ESG crossfire

Well, the firefighters don't deserve that.

Unless they voted the way most teachers do.

13 posted on 03/26/2023 12:18:24 PM PDT by Albion Wilde (“There is no good government at all & none possible.”--Mark Twain)
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