Useful Organisations |
|
Bank of England | Bulletin: Money in the modern economy – an introduction; explains how money is created, if you find it difficult to believe |
Ethex | helping people invest in socially-beneficial businesses and projects, and receive a better return than from a bank |
Ethical Investment Research Services |
independent research into the social, environmental and ethical performance of companies |
Ethiscore | rates companies and products against a range of environmental and ethical criteria |
Fair Pensions | campaigning to ensure that pension funds do not invest in unethical practices such as child labour |
FEASTA | exploring possibilities for a sustainable economy |
institute for Leadership and Sustainability | IFLAS run a regular MOOC (massive open online course) about money – it’s free and very enlightening |
International Movement for Monetary Reform | Network of organisations in several countries educating their populations about the corrupt monetary system |
Monneta | charity founded by the late, great Margrit Kennedy, to promote alternatives to the current financial system; lots of useful resources |
Move Your Money | not-for-profit organisation working to raise awareness about the broad range of financial institutions available to customers in the UK |
New Economics Foundation | radical think tank challenging the dominant global economic ideas |
Positive Money | Group that explains the money system well – lots of information on their website; their solution is to take the power to create money out of the hands of private banks and to give it to a public body. |
Wedge Card | loyalty card for local shops – only in London at the moment |
Blogs & information |
|
(not saying we agree with everything they say, but they’re all very interesting) | |
Alastair McIntosh | Article on the history of usury prohibition |
Automatic Earth | Nicole Foss’s blog |
Bernard Lietaer | advocates currency reform, especially complementary or local currencies |
Debunking Economics | Steve Keen’s website – critic on neoclassical economics, and one of the few who predicted the 2008 crash |
the Ecology of Money | read Richard Douthwaite’s book online |
Exorbitant privilege | the benefit US businesses get from the dollar being the global reserve currency; other countries need dollars, especially to buy oil; the dollar maintains a high value; raw materials and products from overseas are relatively cheap for US businesses and consumers |
Islamic Finance | debate on usury-free banking |
Michael Hudson | analysis of the geo-political machinations of global economics |
the Money Project | all the world’s money and markets in one incredible visualisation |
The Role of Money – what it should be contrasted with what it has become | full text of a book by Frederick Soddy, critical of economic growth and fractional reserve banking |
Rolling Stone | Famous Matt Taibbi ‘giant vampire squid’ article about Goldman Sachs’ political influences |
Low-impact banks & financial institutions |
|
Abundance | invest in renewable energy rather than ISAs etc. |
Climate Sure | carbon-neutral insurance |
Ecology Building Society | ethical savings, and funding for sustainable building projects |
The Ethical Investment Co-operative | co-operative dedicated to ethically and socially responsible investment |
NatureSave Insurance | specialise in insuring environmental and not-for-profit organisations; 10% of premiums invested in environmental projects |
Triodos Bank | finances companies, institutions and projects that add cultural value and benefit people and the environment |