Investment Ethics

Motives for Investment

Although all investors are looking to profit from their investments, nonetheless the motivations for investment can be divided into three distinct classes:

proprietary, monetary, or individual enrichment, and communitarian. Any society or economy is arguably in trouble if it does not maintain a healhy balance between these three, with a healhy occurrence of all three.

Investment is the application of one's effort or resources to an economic endeavor.

An economic endeavor is any activity intended to produce a product or service.

A product or service is any item or activity of human fashioning or elaboration that may be of benefit directly or indirectly to or desired by humans or any living thing.

The proprietary motive for investment is that of someone who has ownership in for the sake of managing, or originates, partly or entirely, an how the ceconomic

endeavor. This intention is marked by a special interest in seeing the continued or ultimate success of the endeavor, even apart from the profit reaped.

The communitarian motive for investment is marked by a special interest in the improvement of the community at large through the economic endeavor invested in, or through his investment in that endeavor. This includes, for example, investment in green or sustainable economic endeavors, community clean-up projects, investment

in the economic development of underdeveloped portions of the economy and the population, etc.

The monetary or personal enrichment motive of investment is that of someone unconcerned with investing for proprietary or communitarian causes, seeking only the result of personal enrichment, with no intrinsic interest in the endeavor per se.

Personal enrichment, in turn, may be for the sake of further investment driven by communitarian or proprietary motivations.