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Value(s)

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Value(s)

Building a Better World for All

Public Affairs,

15 min read
8 take-aways
Audio & text

What's inside?

Modern markets know the price of everything and the value of nothing.

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Editorial Rating

8

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Recommendation

In this call for a new approach to capitalism, Mark Carney lays out a different way of thinking about markets. The ethos of profits-above-all has run its course, he writes; now the developed world must embrace a values-based perspective that stresses the common good over the individual’s self-interest. Carney, a prominent central banker, takes this sprawling study in many directions – it’s a memoir of his years in the financial trenches, a look at history and the legacies of Adam Smith and Magna Carta, and a self-help book focused on the whole of humanity.

Summary

Markets reflect just one narrow trait of humanity.

Mark Carney was at the Vatican for a conference when Pope Francis unexpectedly joined the group. Pointing to the group’s mealtime libations, the pontiff drew a powerful analogy: Grappa is to wine as the market is to humanity. Just as grappa distills all the nuance and flavor from wine into a drink that’s mostly alcohol, the market boils all human inclinations into self-interest. Left to their own devices, markets will behave in a way that’s utterly devoid of humane factors like compassion, fairness, kindness and integrity.

Value and values are close cousins, related but decidedly different sides of the same coin. Values are ethical rules of the road; value is mostly about the price of something. The relationship between value and values is a two-way street: Each can change and drive the other. For instance, a rigid belief in free markets to solve every problem impairs the moral values necessary for a thriving society and economy. But values can also create value: The response to the COVID-19 pandemic, in which nations prioritized the values of life and health, saw the...

About the Author

Mark Carney is UN Special Envoy for Climate Action and an adviser to the British prime minister. He served as governor of the Bank of England from 2013 to 2020 and as governor of the Bank of Canada from 2008 to 2013.

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