# FINANCE: INVESTING AND DIVESTING
The global financial system relies in part on the money invested by individuals, pension funds and institutions. While the primary aim of big hedge funds and investment banks is to maximize profits and minimize taxes, the rest of us can take a more responsible and ethical tack: we can accept a lower monetary return in exchange for the social and environmental benefits of **investing in smaller, more local and community-minded businesses**.
# Investing and divesting Actions
* [ ] Start a local investing group. (Expand Action)
* [ ] Start a community investment fund. (Expand Action)
* [ ] Encourage foundations to shift their capital. (Expand Action)
* [ ] Divest from destructive industries. (Expand Action)
# Voices from the field
* Michael Shuman, author of Local Dollars, Local Sense, is a valued source of information about all aspects of local finance. His talks at Economics of Happiness conferences include A World Without Wall Street, Localising Finance, and Local Finance for Local Economies.
# Policy
* The Pathways to a Peoples’ Economy Toolkit contains a number of policies and case studies on divesting banks from extractive industries and reinvesting in local communities. These are US-based but many are applicable elsewhere.
* Although written during the Occupy Wall Street movement in 2011, this essay by Michael Shuman, A non-partisan idea to help the economy: make it easier to invest in local businesses – describes policy prescriptions that are still relevant today.
# Resources
* Top 24 Tools for Local Investing by Michael Shuman offers a great overview of many of the topics covered on this page, and more.
* How to Raise Local Capital from Locavesting offers more than a dozen methods for local businesses to access funding.
* Democratizing Finance, a recorded panel discussion by the New Economy Coalition, discusses a variety of models for shifting financial systems away from extraction and towards cooperation.
* Michael Shuman's book Put Your Money Where Your Life Is: How to Invest Locally Using Self-Directed IRAs and Solo 401(k)s describes how individuals can invest in their communities and themselves, rather than in Wall Street.