How to make capital gains ethical

A conference nearly three years ago looked at the ethics and morality of Social Impact Bonds. A concise summary of some of the issues discussed raised the question of:

...moral dilemmas that can arise when we place a financial value on social outcomes, and begin to see interventions in the light of the money they can save rather than on their inherent public value. Will it lead to us prioritising certain policy areas simply because they can save us money? Are we giving away too many decisions to unaccountable consultants and investors – and do the service users themselves get a say in any of this? Is it right that investors can gamble on the fortunes, or misfortunes, of others? Social Impact Bonds: are they ethical?, James Ronicle, 28th September 2016

Social Impact Bonds (SIBs) are a non-tradeable version of my original conception: Social Policy Bonds. Tradeability matters more than you might think. As I've explained here and here, when the bonds become tradeable the range of goals that we can target expands greatly, and our time horizons stretch much further into the future. The qualitative effect of a bigger range means that our social and environmental targets can embrace outcomes that a narrower, shorter-term target will exclude. Take for example recidivism rates, targeted by SIBs in the UK and elsewhere. Whereas a SIB regime will reward their reduction, even a large number of such SIBs would do nothing for the long-term health of society as a whole. For a start, narrow, short-term goals increase the likelihood of effective manipulation - a simple example springs to mind: investors in the bonds could subsidise superior legal representation to an offender accused of a new crime. But, more importantly, when we embrace broad, long-term goals, there is no need to prioritise 'certain policy areas simply because they can save us money'. Under a Social Policy Regime there need be no conflict. The policy 'areas' we can prioritise are large enough to include everybody.
It's not so different in other policy areas. SIBs currently target, for instance, academic performance among at-risk three- and four-year olds in Utah, or the number of housing units for the homeless in Massachusetts. Very laudable but, again, apart from these narrow goals being susceptible to crude manipulation (by fiddling test results for instance), they also reward the shifting of resources from untargeted goals to those that will generate short-term gains for bondholders.

This is the key. Social Impact Bonds have to focus on narrow short-term goals that are easily measured. Social Policy Bonds, in contrast, can take a broader, long-term view. They can encompass the goals of society as a whole. Rewards to holders of carefully crafted Social Policy Bonds might still benefit wealthy investors, but only as a by-product of benefiting all of society.

There are bigger possibilities: one of the participants at the above conference asked:

...whether development bonds, where investment is made in developing countries, create a new form of colonialism, as the West profits from interventions in developing countries.

Again, there need be no conflict. Social Policy Bonds targeting, for instance, regional or global conflict, or disaster prevention could benefit both western investors and developing countries. Large capital gains, though widely and understandably viewed with disdain in today's society, don't have to be unethical.

 


For more on this last topic see my previous post. For more on the topic of rewarding people for performing the socially useful function of, for instance, teaching see my blog post here. All my essays on the bonds are accessible from the main Social Policy Bonds site.