The Independent Investor: Is Wall Street Responsible for Climate Change?

Monday's Wall Street sit-in by a few hundred radicals would lead us to believe that Wall Street is responsible for the present changes in the world's climate. Maybe so, but remember this, what Wall Street has done, it can also undo.

Readers know that I am no apologist for big business, the financial community or Wall Street. As for climate change, I am clearly on the side of those 300,000-plus people who participated in the People's Climate March on Sunday. The earth is in jeopardy today thanks to carbon emissions generated by fossil fuels.

The simplistic approach, preferred by this "Flood Wall Street" crowd, condemns Corporate America, Capitalism in general, and oil companies, specifically, for the global dilemma we face. The solution, they offer, is to do away with these entities with the assumption that once that is accomplished, the world shall once again be green and free. If only things were so easy.

Historically, I can understand why they blame all things business. You see, it takes a long time for climate to change, according to the scientific community. As such, we could blame the Robber Barons of the 19th century for today's ills.

After all, without a Rockefeller or Morgan(and Wall Street to fund them), there would be no oil and gas industry, nor railroads to transport these products. Of course, we probably wouldn't have computers or medical technology or a host of other things that makes up today's society either.

We could go back further still in our search for a scapegoat to the Dawn of Industrialization, but then we would have to bring Europe into the equation, specifically Great Britain where it all started. Remember, too, that it was foreign nations, not Wall Street, capitalism or America, that first developed and exploited the globe's natural resources. The world's populations ravaged the earth while mining for coal, tin, gold and dozens of other metals for centuries.

How many forests were cut down worldwide before the New World was even discovered in order to clear the way for population expansion and farming? We wring our hands in anguish today over the downing of trees in the Amazon and other locales but conveniently forget how we have all abused the environment to get us where we are today.

Some say that we need to radically change our priorities. Walk rather than drive, forsake flying and stop mining altogether. Give up fossil fuels even if it would drive the world into a global depression. Radical times, they argue, call for radical solutions.

So who wants to go first, you?

For most of us, those kinds of remedies are beyond the pale, but does that mean that we should simply continue as we are? Of course not, but let's not shoot ourselves in the foot by getting rid of the very engine of change we need to turn around this situation. The forces that got us into this mess are the ones that will get us out of it. Evidence abounds.

It is Wall Street and capitalism that is making it possible for any number of carbon-reducing technologies to flourish. Who funded and is developing the world's first, second and third electric car companies? Where are solar companies getting their backing?

Read my lips: it is private capital that will convert this generation of fossil burning vehicles into one powered by electricity and other clean technologies. Wind farms, rooftop solar panels, organic farming, solar powered utility plants, pollution controls, scrubbers, in fact, just about everything we will need to clean up the environment is either funded by or made by companies that are listed on Wall Street or soon will be.

Yes, world governments have a role in providing the incentives for companies to take a chance on new technologies. But all the governments in the world do not have the money, knowledge or technology to effect climate change. That's the job of the private sector. And as long as there is a profit to be made in cleaning up the environment, Wall Street will be happy to oblige.

So let's use it.

Bill Schmick is registered as an investment adviser representative with Berkshire Money Management. Bill’s forecasts and opinions are purely his own. None of the information presented here should be construed as an endorsement of BMM or a solicitation to become a client of BMM. Direct inquires to Bill at 1-888-232-6072 (toll free) or email him at Bill@afewdollarsmore.com.