Commentary
On Feb. 28, Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) wrote an impassioned appeal in The Wall Street Journal for Republicans to support environmental, social, and governance (ESG) scores because ESG ostensibly represents the free market at work, by offering investors more “choices.”
Schumer appears to be deeply confused about how ESG operates. Or, more likely, he’s pandering to his powerful donors; pro-ESG asset management titan BlackRock reportedly donated more than $100,000 to Schumer’s reelection campaign in 2022.
Whatever the case may be, in reality, ESG results in the complete opposite of what Schumer claims. Putting aside the highly problematic “woke” metrics ensconced in all ESG frameworks, ESG at its core is designed to centralize decision-making power among an enormously powerful public-private cartel of elites and international organizations. It blatantly attempts to fundamentally transform the economy by severely altering traditional methods of assessing risk and allocating capital and credit. Rather than being judged solely based upon material factors such as revenue and the quality of goods and services, entities under ESG are judged based upon their commitments to arbitrary, subjective, political goals such as mitigating climate change and advancing social justice causes….