Quote of the Week: July 15

From the New York Times article Make Money, Save the World, on efforts to decompartmentalize modern philanthropy by encouraging ‘for-benefit corporations’ or ‘for-profit charities’:

“There’s a big movement out there that is not yet recognized as a movement,” said R. Todd Johnson, a lawyer in San Francisco who is working to create an online wiki to engage in the give and take of information for what he calls “for-benefit corporations,” another name for fourth-sector activities. […] Still, whatever participants call it, the fourth sector faces challenges. Current legal and tax structures draw strict lines between for-profits and nonprofits, and fiduciary obligations prevent asset managers from making investments with any aim other than maximizing profit.

[…] “What we are constantly coming up against is our tax laws and our culture,” Ms. Berry said. “The whole fabric of society wants us to make money on one side and do good with it on the other. What we’re saying is: What if we did both things at once?”

She and others argue that current laws, tax structures and definitions of fiduciary responsibility encourage companies to shift costs onto society.