February 27th
We are waiting in the touch down office of a financial officer for our yearly, singular personal visit to the bank to purchase last minute RRSPs, in the hope of “getting our money back” from the government. Having just read The Global Auction: The Broken Promises of Education, Jobs and Income (Brown, Lauder & Ashton, 2011), I slowly and uncomfortably begin identifying, naming and critiquing the sources of unease that surrounds this yearly “tradition”.
First, consider that this occurs once a year. All other banking is conducted through automated processes, online services and via 24 hour call support that has, according to Brown, Lauder & Ashton (2011), been increasingly moved offshore “…at a fraction of the price” (p.51). Next, we are in a touchdown office, designed for privacy and the illusion of white collar professionalism, but devoid of any personal artifacts or sense of permanency. It is a modular space that can ‘pivot’ in configuration and purpose at a moments notice. My relationship with the person I meet here will be as temporary as the space we occupy.
Through the ‘information update’ I am asked about my job and I learn the officer recently arrived in Canada, representing one in a growing global trend (Brown, Lauder & Ashton, 2011) towards high-skill migration and mobility. Our updated data is then instantly aggregated by a computer algorithm, and a suite of options are presented, increasing the productive capacity of the officer. A number of ‘popular’ products are presented, customized/adapted to the local ‘market’. We select a ‘product’ outside our profile and after several minutes of furious typing we are told it is ‘too risky’. The ‘knowledge’ of the platform, program and templates become prioritized over the international experience, extensive training and expertise of the bank officer, reducing them to a “…salesperson armed with a series of software manuals instructing [them] how to sell particular kinds of products…” (p.76). Our meeting ends with the suggestion of setting up ‘automatic contributions’ rationalized as a means of minimizing the negative impact of market fluctuation. I wonder if the officer considers that should we go this route, their services will no longer be required, that they are selling their own redundancy?
However, for as clear and interesting as these observations were, there was also a moment in this meeting of profound “Ugggghhhhh” created by the uncomfortable silence when I inquired into ‘ethical investment options’. While the blank stare I received could be interrupted as linguistic miscommunication or as an uncomfortable acknowledgement that the bank had no products marketed as ‘ethical’, upon reflection I have ascribed, “Seriously, you are in a bank investing and you are worried about ethics!” to this look and silence.
What is the underlying philosophy of a Registered Retirement Savings Plan? Through tax policy, the government is moving security for the aging from the collective/community/state to the responsibility of the individual. I buy into this so I can ‘save’ paying taxes. My income tax return takes funds out of general coffers, allowing the state to claim “poor” when it comes to supporting the public good. I am generating personal ‘wealth’ and should I not manage to consume it before my death, the assets will be distributed to my stakeholders. On a micro scale I am participating in the same legalized and bureaucratic structure that allows companies like Amazon and Google to avoid taxes and reap massive profits for shareholders.
Harvey (2020) asks if finance is productive of value, noting the role of the financial sector is to absorb the notes of exponential growth with a fiduciary obligation to get the highest rate of return for investors. Economists, such as Roche and Jakub (2017), attempt to offer a plan for sustainable prosperity, much in the same way companies market environmentalism via consumption. For a brief moment, as we sat through graphs and charts of 3-year, 5-year and 10-year return rates promising ‘free’ money and ‘growth’; I thought we could have our cake and eat it too. However, even a cursory look at portfolios reminded me the idea of ethical surplus seems as incongruent as Halal bacon.
And of course, the fact that we even have funds available to personally ‘invest’ in RRSPs suggests that we have more than we need to meet our current basic needs. Raised in a working class household the conditioning has been that ‘I earned’ this surplus and are therefore entitled to profit from it, but the uncomfortable truth is that the money in the bank is as much the product of language/race/ablest/heteronormative privilege, random chance and the exploitation of others, as it is from my efforts, labour and/or personal investment into education and training- my human capital. Brown, Lauder & Ashton (2001) illustrate how this relative privilege from human capital may then be reproduced and guarded through educational opportunities and labour practices.
Reading The Global Auction: The Broken Promises of Education, Jobs and Income was like cleaning the windows after the winter, it allowed for a clearer, crispier view of many of the routine and mundane tasks of life. It also reminds that the dirt will also still accumulate through the dusty and dirty spring.
References
-Brown, P., Lauder, H., & Ashton, D. (2012). The global auction: The broken promise of jobs, education, and incomes. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
-Harvey, D. (2020). The Anti-Capitalist Chronicles. Pluto Press
-Roche, B., & Jakub, J. (2017). Completing Capitalism : Heal Business to Heal the World. Berrett-Koehler Publishers.