There is a reason why I pay to subscribe to the Daily Telegraph. It comes from the schadenfreude that I get when they have to publish commentary like this:
Heatwaves are jeopardising retirement as extreme weather events threaten investment returns, the pensions industry has warned.
Climate change is becoming a major risk for trillions of pounds in pension savings as increasingly unpredictable weather damages assets, disrupts supply chains and hits productivity, according to a report by the Society of Pension Professionals (SPP).
Calum Cooper, the president of the SPP, said: “Put simply, you can't separate the future of pensions from the future of the economy. And you cannot separate the future of the economy from climate change.
“That means that climate risk is now retirement risk.”
I took a deep breath to recover from the shock (irony alert).
You could have knocked me down with a feather! How did this happen without any prior warning from the Torygraph? Didn't their readers need this broken to them a little more subtly?
And now, to be serious: I have known this since I was in my teens. This was the first serious economics book I ever read:
I was about 17 back then, I think.
The Telegraph has just noticed.
They might, with all their neoliberal friends, have spent years slagging off those of us with environmental concerns, who created the Green New Deal, and were, according to them, "woke", but we were right all along.
And now our truth is hitting their bottom lines.
Will that make things happen now?
Don't bet on it. Neoliberals live in the present, denying there is a future at all through the process of discounting to which they are so very dedicated. The result? They dismiss concerns about what might happen, precisely because they assume them away.
In the real world, we can't. But they're in charge of the purse strings right now. And that's why we're in trouble.
Thanks for reading this post.
You can share this post on social media of your choice by clicking these icons:
There are links to this blog's glossary in the above post that explain technical terms used in it. Follow them for more explanations.
You can subscribe to this blog's daily email here.
And if you would like to support this blog you can, here:
Buy me a coffee!
Likely the future focus of the Deformgraph will be how to make the lives of the better off more comfy when faced with heatwaves, floods, plague of locusts, etc. There is no interest in causes because that would cause societal change – can’t have that eh what!!. My advice – invest in manufacturers of air conditioners (hell set up a business installing them!).
Blimey and on the same day as the Germans lost a World Cup penalty shoot out!
More seriously, there is more on the way with the current El Nino. The BBC’s current Climate Question podcast focusses on this. It is informative and well worth a listen. However the mainstream corporate media remains in almost total denial and would rather distract us by focussing on the Westminster soap opera. The question is: for how much longer can they get away with this?
A week next Tuesday, ad infinitum right now
As we can’t separate the future of pensions from the future of the economy perhaps the SPP will now support the campaign for change to the law of fiduciary duty.
Are they? That would be good
I don’t know if they are supporting the efforts being made by ShareAction and some other organisations to reform the law of fiduciary duty. There was an amendment to the Pension Scheme Bill (Amendment 128A) that sought to reform the law of fiduciary duty and I believe some sort of commission has been set up to consider this. ShareAction have representation in this process.
I hope they succeed
As pensioners (and potential pensioners) are the main base of right wing voters, things may change, but don’t hold your breath. Fossil fuel companies will not budge yet without a major political shift.
Aha I also read Mishans book many years ago. Its still on my bookshelf. Its worrying but not surprising that while some of us realised the issues many years ago, it seems that probably the majority are (maybe) catching up. I think we have to exclude those who say ‘Oh yes all this climate change is a real problem but – I cannot make a difference, theres nothing the UK can do etc etc’!
Don’t worry. The Jewish Chronicle has a major smear piece coming out, possibly this Friday, against the Green deputy-leader Mothin Ali, which will make clear that all this climate change paranoia is just antisemitic terrorism and needs clamping down on with the full force of the state apparatus. (Irony alert)
Maybe Lorin Bell-Cross can take down the Telegraph and its new owner in next week’s edition of JC, and nip this climate-change lefty myth in the bud, before the public find out. I’m sure our Home Secretary can prepare some new legislation to make references to climate change, evidence of terrorism, and get anyone with solar panels or an EV, locked up.
Someone from the German government will need to have a chat to Mr Springer? Or maybe it works the other way round nowadays?
I wish I was exaggerating.
Meanwhile, real AS and real Islamophobia get nastier by the day.
The Romans had an idiom for things like this “when a mule foals” or “cum mula peperit”, this is the equivalent of “when hell freezes over”. A new one could be “when the Torygraph acknowledges human driven climate change” 😉
🙂
It’s now in the Torygraph’s self-interest to worry about climate change, since its readers may be impoverished or their lives shortened by it. The rest of us could roast or starve for all its leadership cares.
Correct