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Thanks again for putting that in perspective!
PS one of the reasons I left the bank was the pressure to sell BS like most of the structured products.
I can't see any baby killing going on - indeed, quite the reverse. The charity / church / endowment is spending the money that it can spend on whatever its vision or charter of a good deed is.
And then the charity / church / endowment has funds it has for investment to ensure a stable flow of income over the future to be able to keep doing that spending.
And of course it would certainly prefer its investments to not be making things worse faster than the revenue those investment provide can be used to make things better, since in that case it would be doing more good burning up the money in a bonfire (in a chamber with exhaust treated, of course).
Now BigBadBank steps in to squeeze a little bit extra out of the transaction - but if a fund is available that has similar positive externalities and offers better return (say, MediumSizedSlightlyLessBadBank does the same trick but squeezes less off the top), then they can invest in that fund instead.
Provided BigBadBank cannot monopolize the process - and as described they enter too late into the process to be able to monopolize it - then the amount they can squeeze of the top is due to the baby killing effect of other available investments, and the "evil" is that baby killing could be reduced by still more if less was sliced off the top.
But that is a general ill of the system itself, and not increased because the wind farm was developed. I've been accused of being a Marxist, yet while Harpo's my favourite, it's Groucho I'm always quoting. Odd, that.
And as you also state at then end, it is a general ill of the system (which many "normal" investors were not aware of in the past, though now the media does every so often direct attention to such topics such as here in Germany where there were quite some stories on the bad advice that banks were giving their clients (as they are selling products and not advice)) and money invested in a wind farm is pretty clearly one of the "better" investments that one can make for the good of the earth and mankind...
Presumably the charity can consult several banks to see which one offers the best overall package?
What is trickier is if the proposed structures end up putting other risks on the charity than what it expected to bear, or that the structure is sold as something it isn't (as happened with whole classes of the "structured products" of recent years). In the long run, we're all dead. John Maynard Keynes
indeed, I meant that the charity could have MORE money if BigBank wouldn't sell the wind farm overpriced but for a fair price and could thus save more children like you said tat the end.
But that's comparing to a hypothetical bank which is not a commercial corporation. Indeed, on that standard, people who give money to the charity are not baby killers because they "could have given a little bit more" ... so its not a pragma that stands up to scrutiny.
The standard is, are those children better off if the BigBadBank does the action - in the way that it does actions - or if the BigBadBank does not do the action. Clearly, provided the BigBadBank is not granted a monopoly, they are better off if the BigBadBank does engage in the financing then if it does not. I've been accused of being a Marxist, yet while Harpo's my favourite, it's Groucho I'm always quoting. Odd, that.
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