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The question of morality in investments is not absolute; it depends on how one frames responsibility and agency.
Markets are amoral tools. Financial markets operate independently of moral judgments. When individuals invest in an industry, they are not necessarily endorsing its practices but recognizing an opportunity within existing systems. One can argue that targeting an investment does not equate to creating or exacerbating the problems within that industry.
The existence of private prisons and deportation schemes reflects systemic issues, not individual investors. Policies and demand for incarceration stem from government choices and public sentiment. As such, targeting investors as "bad people" shifts focus away from the policymakers and institutions enabling these systems.
Some may justify these investments pragmatically: by securing financial stability, individuals can later support progressive causes, donate to charities, or fund organizations fighting for systemic change. For example, an investor might use the returns to support immigrant advocacy groups or lobby for prison reform.
There is algo "Separation of Investment and Values". Not every decision must align with one’s ideological framework. People often compartmentalize their personal lives from their professional or financial strategies. A leftist could rationally engage in capitalism as a survival mechanism within an inescapable capitalist framework while still advocating for systemic change.
Many industries—tech, energy, or agriculture—have problematic practices, from exploitative labor to environmental harm. Singling out private prisons overlooks the broader complexity of investing in any sector. Most portfolios inadvertently include industries with ethical concerns, such as fossil fuels or fast fashion.
Defending this investment as not inherently immoral hinges on the premise that financial actions alone do not define someone’s character. Morality lies in how individuals balance their actions, mitigate harm, and contribute positively to society. However, ethical investments often require introspection and alignment with long-term values. While investing in private prison contractors can be defended on pragmatic or systemic grounds, it’s worth questioning whether the financial gain outweighs the potential ethical compromise.
Hmmm, are you saying workers are alienated from each other via the market? Social relations are mediated by commodities and money??
I swear I've heard this somewhere before...
Are you saying is not? When applied to investments, the abstraction becomes even more pronounced. As investors, individuals might focus on profit potential (commodities and returns) without directly engaging with or even acknowledging the human or social costs underlying those profits. The market acts as a buffer, depersonalizing the consequences and further alienating participants from the broader social implications of their actions.
So, yes, you’ve heard this before, and it’s a classic critique of how capitalism distorts and reframes human connections in terms of profit and exchange! Marx argues that under capitalism, commodities take on a life of their own, obscuring the labor and social relations that produced them. The true connections between people—worker to worker, worker to consumer, are hidden behind the veil of market exchange.
No, I agree wholeheartedly. My point was rather the abstraction of it just means it's easier for the investment-minded human to justify their lack of direct connection to the mass jailing of innocents while actually being directly connected to the horrors of it. They feel like they're not connected to it by the abstraction of the market.
I get what you’re saying, and I don’t disagree that the abstraction makes it easier for investors to detach themselves from the reality of what’s happening. But at the same time, isn’t that part of how all markets work? Investors don’t make the rules—they just operate within them. When it comes to private prisons, for example, the wrongful imprisonment of innocents or mass deportations aren’t supposed to be part of the “business model.” That’s a failure of the state, not the investor. In theory, these facilities exist to meet state demand for detention, which should be lawful and just (even if we know that’s not always the case).
And honestly, this kind of abstraction isn’t unique to private prisons. Look at almost any other industry:
Investing in food companies? You’re indirectly supporting things like worker exploitation, environmental damage, or factory farming (which involves a lot of animal suffering). Transportation? Cars, planes, and ships pollute the planet on a massive scale. Tech? There’s often exploitative labor behind those shiny gadgets, not to mention privacy violations or harmful social media algorithms. Fashion? Fast fashion profits off sweatshops and massive environmental waste.
If you zoom in on any one of these industries, the moral complications are everywhere. But most of us don’t expect investors to shoulder the blame for all of this—they’re operating within the system as it exists. To me, the real responsibility lies with governments and regulators to set the rules and hold these industries accountable. Investors aren’t actively making the decisions that harm people; they’re just responding to opportunities in the market.
At the end of the day, if we reject every investment tied to something morally gray, we’d have to swear off almost everything. I think that’s where the abstraction helps—it lets people focus on their role (whether as investors, consumers, or workers) without taking on all the guilt for how the system fails. Is it perfect? No, but it’s how the world works right now.