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Grantham: We're Losing The 'Race Of Our Lives'

FYI: Famed asset manager Jeremy Grantham called upon the world to wake up to the threat of global warming, pollution and the depletion of the world's natural resources in a new white paper that concluded human civilization is in a race for its survival—and is losing.

"Thirty years ago, the dire predictions of leading climate scientists were laughed at," wrote the founder of Boston-based asset manager GMO. "Now we watch these predictions coming true and ignore the data or pretend to. So, as the world starts to burn up, we twiddle our thumbs and talk about 'just another heat wave!' God help us."
Regards,
Ted
https://www.fa-mag.com/news/grantham--we-re-losing-the--race-for-our-lives-40220.html?print

Jeremy Grantham White Paper: The Race Of Our Lives Revisited:
https://www.gmo.com/docs/default-source/research-and-commentary/strategies/asset-allocation/the-race-of-our-lives-revisited.pdf

Comments

  • Preaching to the choir here Mr. Grantham. It's difficult to read the handwriting on the wall with your head in the sand. Heat wave indeed.
  • edited August 2018
    Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers with some big-name back-ups. Performance from the 30th-year-career tribute concert for (and with) Bob Dylan. Apropos on this thread. Great rendition: "License To Kill."


    LYRICS:
    https://www.bobdylan.com/songs/license-kill/
  • edited August 2018
    This one expresses our natural reaction for what's happening. Can we manage to get out of our own way? "While My Guitar Gently Weeps."
  • just imagine next summer, and three from now, and five, and a decade from now
  • Every time I hear Grantham I keep thinking about those broken clocks that are only correct twice a day. He may be intelligent and makes some excellent macro points in his various missives over the years but apparently he's unable to adapt to the present times and still lives in the world of should-be versus as-is.

    I do believe he's right that we're in for major problems. But unless he can say precisely when they'll occur, at this point he's coming across as another Intelligent Person Who Cried Wolf --- ie, like perma-bull Marc Faber. And we all know the odds of successfully market-timing anything are rarely in the market-timer's favour....
  • My education and most of my working career was involved with environmental protection. Climate change is very real, supported by strong reasoning and scientific evidence. The politics over climate change makes me very sad, the triumph of ignorance and short term greed over rational thinking and scientific evidence. Future generations will look back at our era and wonder: What were they thinking? Not unlike how we look back now at slavery.

    Unfortunately we are quickly approaching the point, and we may have already passed it, where it is too late to take meaningful actions to stop or slow climate change. Ironically, business “friendly” conservatives are going to pay a very high price for inaction, but so will everyone else. The people who have been urging action will have a hollow victory, being able to say “we told you so,” but I’m sure that conservatives will find a way to shift blame elsewhere.

    40-50 years ago, many conservatives supported environmental protection, and many of our landmark environmental laws passed with strong bipartisan support. We now generally have cleaner water and air quality as a result, as well as many incredible national parks and preserves. What legacy will today’s conservatives have, other than lower taxes for the wealthy and less regulation of businesses?
  • I join @Tarwheel in lamenting what we humans have failed to do to protect ourselves and our planet. The saddest experience I've had in this area in the last couple of weeks is reading "Losing Earth" (https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2018/08/01/magazine/climate-change-losing-earth.html
    in the Times Magazine. Learning of what the real consequences of the Reagan administration's environmental policies are and how the GHW Bush White House (i.e., Sununu) deep-sixed the 1989 global environmental agreement that was about to be negotiated underscored for me how absolutely devastating are the anti-environment policies at Interior, Energy, and EPA that have been taken since the current administration took power. The Economist's lead article at the same time points out how screwed we are; Grantham may not be able to predict when the catastrophe will occur, but he is right that it's coming.

  • +1. The frequency and severity of weird weather events in recent years ranging from storms to seasons that last barely a week and more are a clear sign that Mother Nature is rather upset at what we're doing to her. Sadly, nobody in charge is listening...or cares.
    BenWP said:

    I join @Tarwheel in lamenting what we humans have failed to do to protect ourselves and our planet.

  • Who here in the US can we blame for ignoring the reality of climate change? Who can we blame for doing nothing or even going out of their way to to MAKE THINGS WORSE? The same party that is literally is on the wrong side of every issue. This is clearly a topic that links business, politics, morality and the market and as always,,,,, the repuglicans are the party of destruction and shortsighted selfish greed.
  • Ding. +1.
  • Hey man, we gotta have "growth". (He said sarcastically.)
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