this post was submitted on 03 Nov 2024
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How the hell can the presidential candidate of the Green Party own a MILLION DOLLARS OF OIL AND GAS SHARES? How can you complain about Israel murdering children in Gaza, when you own shares in Raytheon, which sells and produces weapons for and in Israel?
Where are you seeing this?
The article claims that she has total stock market index funds in her retirement account and not individual oil and gas shares…
They even link the full financial disclosure that reveals as much: https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/un8w34x8anzochjjik2dw/2024-Stein-PFD.pdf?rlkey=no0vsygaof1096tgm3843kwup&st=10vwoc8x&dl=0
This is literally insulting to anyone with any understanding of “investments”:
This is a super sketchy way to portray a very normal total market index funds…
And everybody knows that total market includes fossil fuel and arms companies. That is why there are ESG funds, which do exclude the really nasty companies. Those are pretty easy to buy and can also cover a large field of investments. She has lobbied for divestement from fossil fuels, so she should very much be aware that those options are around, while this has been pointed out for nearly a decade. So really no excuse for that.
Surely, if you're the Green party leader, you would simply not invest in that particular index fund, and probably would not invest at Vanguard either. When people say you should "divest from fossil fuels", it obviously also means taking your money out of these index funds.
It's funny how easy it is, but no, let's jump through hoops to justify it.
This is literally the entire stock market, excluding US. All publicly traded companies worldwide. It's the epitomy of the "set it and forget it" investment strategy. If you don't know how to invest, this, coupled with VTI and a bond ETF or two, would be exactly what you would own, and nothing more.
You would, if you don't give a shit, yes.
But if you're actually fighting for a green transition, this is definitely not what you buy. Especially if you have the kind of money available to you that she has. Putting your money where your mouth is incredibly important. I don't even know why I am repeating this — the article put it quite succinctly.
She could've used fossilfreefunds.org to pick something that wasn't invested in oil or prison slave labor.
This is also what you would invest in if you don’t want any appearance of conflict of interest with your political aspirations. Y’all gotta let this one go
Yeah, people here clearly do not understand that this is the most benign investment strategy that could exist.
Surely you can see the problem there?
You're the reason financial literacy needs to be taught in schools. I don't even support the existence of investing, but you need to look up how index funds work.