PR for People® Book Review
by Barbara Lloyd McMichael
Let’s face it: Wall Street has suffered a pretty bad rap over the years. From the Great Depression to the Great Recession, from “greed is good” to “Too Big to Fail” – it’s enough to make Joe Average a little queasy about investing his hard-earned dollars in a market that seems mercurial at best, and evil at worst.
Trends show that Americans – all except the wealthiest 10 percent – are investing far less than they used to.
Enter Marc de Sousa-Shields, who thinks that investing can be a force for good. In his new book, “Invest Like You Give a Damn,” he encourages folks to take seriously their ability to change the world by aligning their money with their values.
Sousa is a corporate sustainability advisor who has worked in 80 countries as a proponent of SRI – Socially Responsible Investing. He addresses the current “investo-phobia” that currently seems to have a grip on so many of us, and points out a number of different ways SRI already has made an impact.
Since as far back as the 1960s, SRI professionals have been challenging conventional investment models, researching ethical corporate practices, and pioneering high-impact investment alternatives. The result: SRI assets today amount to $6.7 trillion.
As one of the SRI proponents interviewed for this book puts it, “We are… coming out of Caveman Capital into the era of Camelot Capital, or capital that is a driving force for building the kind of world we want.”
But in order for this kind of beneficial investment to continue growing and to make a significant difference, more investors need to enter the market.
“So,” De Sousa-Shields writes, “let’s get you off the proverbial couch and invest.”
The author tends to make his pitch to Gen Xers and the Millennial crowd, but there is plenty in this book that Baby Boomers can draw on, too.
“Invest Like You Give a Damn” may adopt an irreverent tone, but that’s candy-coating for solid financial planning advice and portfolio-building guidance.
Barbara Lloyd McMichael writes book reviews for the Seattle Times and is also the author of the syndicated book review column “The Bookmonger.” Her PR for People® Book Review is written exclusively for The Connector.
Invest Like You Give a Damn – Marc de Sousa-Shields
New Society Publishers – 256 pp - $18.99