Social investment movement has touched a Republican nerve
Applause for Renée Loth’s column on red-state militancy against the environmental-social-governance investing movement (“Social investing isn’t ‘woke capitalism,’ ” Feb. 7). GOP efforts to pass laws blocking state pension funds from using ESG criteria and punishing asset managers that screen for climate vulnerability are just two aspects of a broader campaign that has extended to the federal level.
Republicans in Congress have now focused on short-circuiting an ESG rule proposed by the Securities and Exchange Commission that would strengthen and standardize reporting of climate risks and policies by large corporations. The rule would give corporations an incentive to reduce carbon emissions while improving transparency for investors.
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That the rule seems to have touched a Republican nerve suggests that it might be quite effective. The GOP undoubtedly sees it as a threat to the fossil fuel industry, which the party has historically coddled. The SEC is on to something worthwhile.
Frederick Hewett
Cambridge
What planet are House Republicans living on?
Upon reading the reporting regarding the GOP push to undermine investments tracking environmental, social, and corporate governance factors (“Republicans are about to beat the ESG drum even harder,” Business, Feb. 9), I was left to wonder, yet again:
Do these people have children and grandchildren?
Do they have something against a livable climate?
Are they going to take their earnings from fossil fuel and related industries and spend it on Planet B?
This is not, as they were quoted to say, a “political” issue. It is an all-hands-on-deck survival issue.
Judith Black
Marblehead