Slim pickings?_其他_趣味英语-查字典英语网

Slim pickings?

3. Did you know that Woolworths now controls 14,000 poker machines? The supermarket company has followed the money down the street to the pub, where cash that some might say should be spent on groceries is instead being spent on the often fruitless activity of trying to get three oranges in a straight line on a screen. So, is Woolworths still a supermarket chain, or is it a gambling company? And if it’s a gambling company, should ethical investors – those of us who try to exert some control over what’s done with our money – avoid investing in this immensely popular stock?

After a decade-long share-market boom – only marginally clouded by the reversals of early June – ethical investing has moved from the margins to the mainstream. From a standing start in the 1980s the industry has flourished, and today there is at least $7 billion in funds that lay claim to being guided by ethical considerations. But when you get that sort of money washing around, the pioneering idealists that started the industry suddenly face stiff competition. What’s more, the working definition of “ethical” becomes malleable.

The stakes have risen so high because of compulsory superannuation. On 1 July 2005, “superannuation choice” became law, allowing employees to choose where they invest their superannuation money. It’s no coincidence that the range of ethical funds is widening dramatically. But are all these funds, well, ethical? If Woolworths’ gambling activities came as a surprise to you, no doubt it will seem just as odd that some ethical funds have invested in the asbestos company James Hardie and the uranium miner BHP.