I’m fairly realistic about humans and the things they do, on the whole. I don’t expect much from society and I am seldom disappointed. I try and keep abreast of the latest developments in human selfishness and depravity as, in order to fight your enemy you must understand it, but sometimes it is depressing keeping track of all the harm we do. Once in a while it is nice to focus instead on some of the good humans are capable of, and so today here is my “honor roll”:
- Bill and Melinda Gates
In 2001 the long running antitrust case between the US government and Microsoft came to an end. The case didn’t dent the company’s profitability too much, of course (although there are signs that its star is fading as Google’s rises), but it did seem to rather disillusion Bill Gates, and he separated himself and his personal fortune from the company’s and went off to set up the Gates Foundation. The charity is not without critics[1], but it is certainly mind-bogglingly large and has staggering potential to do good. Notably their vaccine and health program is working to eradicate polio once and for all.
- Warren Buffet
A pretty darned successful and wealthy investor, Warren Buffett overtook Bill Gates as the worlds richest man in 2008. He is famed for spending little, in spite of his huge wealth, and describes the current turbulent time on Wall Street as “poetic justice”. His fortune is in the region of $60 billion dollars, however, he has pledged to give away 99% of that money (much of it to the Gates Foundation). 1% of 50 billion is still 500 million, so his family and he will hardly starve, but still, 99%! It would seem he also places a great deal of importance on charitable giving of time as well as money and while he admits he himself does not donate his time (although he must spend some time on his philanthropic work as he does a fair amount), he has apparently brung his children up right, because he says they do. When you read what he has to say, Warren Buffet appears to just be a good man. There are too few of those around, so we are lucky that the richest two people in the world apparently fall into that bracket.
Between them, Warren Buffett and Bill and Malinda Gates have persuaded a further 40 US billionaires to pledge at least 50% of their wealth to charity. I wonder if that is enough to shift those “2% of the world’s population possess 50% of its wealth” statistics? The sums involved are vast, so it might just…
- Google
Google are the new Microsoft, which means it is fashionable to distrust them and assume they are out for nothing except power and money. Yet, if you scratch the surface, you find a solid core of ethical business practices that appears to be more than fancy words. Their green initiatives arm is doing a lot to make the company as close to carbon neutral as is currently possible and they recently invested in two new wind farms. They have a philanthropic arm too and, while it isn’t as big or as dramatic as Warren Buffett’s gesture, it uses employee time and the technology Google has invented to track and help solve real world problems away from the internet.
- Innocent
As well as making darned tasty smoothies (and other things[2]), the Innocent Smoothie Company are more devoted to ethical and sustainable business practices than any other company I have come across. Every single step of their manufacturing process is carefully balanced against the environmental and human cost. They carefully research the best places to buy their ingredients and they recently started the process of shifting some of their mango buying to Kenya for no reason other than they wish to start contributing to African economies. They not only use the latest recycled and recyclable packaging in all their products, but they also research and develop new and improved sustainable packaging which feeds into that used by other companies. Their premises are, like Google’s, run to be as sustainable as possible, with great care taken over not only their carbon footprint, but also their water one. Oh, and there is, of course, a foundation that takes 10% of the company’s profits and donates it to the communities where they buy their fruit.
I don’t believe in evil people, only evil acts, and I suppose that means I don’t believe in naturally good people either, but these few people and companies are demonstrating that you can accumate wealth for reasons other than simple acquisitiveness and that a business does not have to be evil in order to be profitable. I just hope everyone else catches on before it is too late; we are already standing dangerously close to the edge.
