ADAPTED FROM ORGANIZED MONEY
FLEXING PROGRESSIVE “MONEY MUSCLE”
We wrote Organized Money to challenge the financial system at its core.
We also wrote to explain to progressives and liberals that they need to understand how the financial system is working counter to their ambitions and values so that they will act to change it.
We propose a strategy to organize the power of money so that the progressive movement can make the most of a seismic shift we see building throughout finance and business. Our purpose is to influence the mainstream financial system and the policy makers that shape it by demonstrating the value and urgency of progressive approaches to money
To that end, we envision a market-scale, full-service progressive financial network to organize at least $1 trillion of the considerable wealth that progressive people and enterprises hold today. That network will include banks, insurance companies, credit unions, investment banks, venture capital and private equity firms, impact investors, community development financial institutions (CDFIs), socially responsible investment managers, and individuals. It will be profitable so that it can be sustainable, with the understanding that profit is not the same thing as greed. There are countless ways for financial institutions to make profits at different levels over time that make it possible—often more likely—for them to prosper economically as well as socially.
“Organized money holds immense power and influence, which we call money muscle.”
That infrastructure will rest on the principle our nation’s financial system was founded on—that public gains need to balance private ones. That principle has been undermined by conservative and libertarian pursuit of self-interest beyond reason to greed shaped by an ideology we call market fundamentalism. Our strategy rejects market fundamentalism in favor of progressive finance—allowing for private gains while expecting inclusive and sustainable social, economic, environmental, and political outcomes as well.
In contrast to conservative finance—a system of private gains leveraged off public risk sharing—progressive finance is a balance of public and private gains based on public and private risk sharing.
To implement a progressive finance strategy, the left is going to have to face up to some shortcomings of its own. Progressives undervalue and under utilize organized money—the management, structure, systems, and control of our financial lives and our financial world. Instead they rely heavily on organized people and organized government action, often with incomplete and frustrating results. Making things worse for themselves, progressive give control of their money to conservatives.
Organized money holds immense power and influence, which we call money muscle. The U.S. financial sector is the dominant economic, political, social, and cultural force in the world. It largely determines who in the private and public sectors gets to do what with the extraordinary amount of money in play. And it is deeply and proudly conservative. The U.S. government is powerful in other ways, but it is in fact dependent on and shaped in significant and substantial ways by the financial sector.
“In contrast to conservative finance—a system of private gains leveraged off public risk sharing—progressive finance is a balance of public and private gains based on public and private risk sharing.”
The important question is not whether our world revolves around organized money (it does) or whether it is organized by government or markets (they are inseparable and interdependent). The key is who controls how money is organized and what they do with it.
We wrote Organized Money for a third reason, as well. We believe the system we have for organizing money—the financial system—is a public asset as well as a private business. We want it to work well, fairly, and profitably. We are fighting for an inclusive prosperity built on one fair economy, not two separate and unequal economies. Our nation and our world need a financial system that works for it.
Progressives have the means—the wealth, the knowledge, and the expertise—to transform the financial system in service to progressive values, for the common good, and away from conservative outcomes. We want you to understand what we can achieve so that progressives will use our own money muscle in line with our values and goals to make the next progressive era structural, systemic, and enduring.”