This is a repository for discussing an idea tentatively titled Social Credit Rating. It is intended as:
"an always-on coach to help your daily economic decisions reflect both your social values and the realities of your life."
Social Credit Rating is a working name for this project. This initiative is intended to function as:
An always-on coach to help your daily economic decisions reflect your social values within the realities of your life.
Much has been written on the U.S. political situation and will not be repeated here. The starting point for this initiative is how we have reached this dire situation: as always, "follow the money." The book Dark Money is essential background reading. The policy preferences of the wealthiest Republican donors are considerably to the right of even mainstream Republicans. In short, money buys power and the billions of dollars concentrated in the hands of extreme right interests led directly to the situation that we find ourselves today.
One can argue whether increasing inequality and political tyranny are inevitable outcomes of capitalism, or just the variation of American capitalism we face. I’m agnostic on this topic. The pressing question is one of strategy and action. If right-wing billionaires are taking control of our political democracy, is there some way to reduce their economic base of power?
The progressive movement is not without assets. I believe that a large majority of progressive people in the United States are aghast at the current situation and fearful for their families' future. This popular mass represents a considerable base of intelligent, motivated individuals with both talent and significant economic surplus at their disposal. The problem is that, other than the electoral system, the avenues for collective action are fragmented into a wide array of interest groups. These groups can be effective on point issues, but (especially since the decline of the labor unions) there has been no broad-based, countervailing, general-interest force outside of the Democratic Party.
According to Wikipedia, the U.S. economy is currently $16.78 trillion, of which roughly 70% is consumer-driven. This represents a massive leverage point of up to $12 trillion. Indeed, "vote with your dollar" is an old concept and, while boycotts have occasionally been effective tactically, as a stand-alone strategy they rarely resulted in structural change. (A notable counterexample: the boycotts against South African apartheid in the 1960s grew into 1980s divestment campaigns and finally international sanctions that created a progressive leap forward in the region.) However, it seems that a number of factors may be converging to increase potential effectiveness of a progressive, consumer-driven approach to eroding the power of the politically-extreme, wealthy Right.
I propose building a state of the art platform based on social media, mobile technology, and data analytics, using current neuroscience and behavioral economics, with cutting edge user experience design, to help people guide their everyday financial choices in an integrated fashion toward expression of their progressive values.
Think about the potential. If millions of people were being nudged on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis to make even marginally better decisions for the sake of the planet and society, that would start to add up into real impacts. Product lines sales, retail traffic, and stock prices would move according to the values of the app users. We exert continuous, sustained pressure on the economy itself, and hit the Right where it hurts, through the daily decisions of millions of consumers who need to do nothing more than seek guidance from this easy-to-use app.
This effort would be run with modern digital product development techniques, focusing on value, usability, and feasibility. It may well be that there are fatal flaws. After thinking about the idea for about two years and discussing it with a wide variety of intelligent and credentialed people, I have yet to find any. I think the idea is at least worth placing a bet on.
The current situation is grave. We owe it to ourselves and our families to explore all options. Please have a look at the more detailed approach discussion in the remaining pages, and let me know what you think.
There are distinctions within the 1%. Some are extreme right wingers who appear to favor a single-party state in the US, with no controls on corporate power, and no social safety net. Charles and David Koch and their network of right wing political funds are perhaps the pre-eminent example. Other economic leaders are more benign: Warren Buffet, Bill Gates, Elon Musk. At a corporate level, some corporations do take courageous stands on issues like LGBT recognition, and are attacked from the Right for doing this. Also, there are local alternatives to be supported in many cities.
We can quantify a social credit rating for the business organization aggregating and reflecting their values. It will be a 300-900 point score just like consumer credit rating. The app would cover both channel (e.g. Target the retailer) as well as product (e.g. Pringle’s potato chips). By enabling people to easily apply the credit rating to their daily economic decisions, we would start to drive and exploit divisions among the wealthy, through exerting leverage via the channel they understand best.
A company with a poor history of union issues, but a strong LGBT stance, is still preferable to patronize compared to a company that is bad on both, and sometimes the consumer has to choose between those limited options. Oil companies are bad, but they can be ranked as well. Perhaps it’s better to buy gas at a Shell or BP station, or a local provider, and avoid the Exxon station down the street. But without analytics and a feedback mechanism, the consumer is powerless.
The market economy requires certain information to function. Business agreements, valuations, partnerships, lawsuits, changes of ownership, and so forth are often known. To a large degree, the "free market" system cannot fight the strategy suggested here without disabling itself. And lack of transparency itself could be a factor contributing to a corporation’s negative score.
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65.8 million: Clinton popular vote
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13.2 million: Sanders primary vote
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156.5 million: Facebook US users
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67 million: Twitter US users
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70-100 million: Monthly Huffingtonpost.com readers
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1.7 million: Monthly users of REI.com
Social applications and ecommerce are major social forces. High-income, professional, and progressively-minded people almost universally use Internet channels. The aggregated economic decisions of even 20 million consumers, if nudged towards an end, could have a big impact on the market. Competition at the margins could drive corporate behavior. P&L managers struggling for that 0.25 basis point increase might lose bonuses. Sales losses could start to move stock valuations and bring pressure to bear where it hurts. If extreme right wingers are propping up their companies, they won’t be able to spend as much buying politicians.
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“I try to shop responsibly but it’s so hard"
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“It’s too complicated to keep track of who is evil & what I should avoid & what I can buy"
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“Sometimes I’ve got no choice but to go to Wal-Mart"
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"Scan barcodes with my phone in the grocery store? With a screaming toddler in the cart and 15 minutes to pick up my husband? Are you KIDDING?"
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OK so I read this article and decide to boycott FedEx… but does that mean I should use UPS?
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Or are both equally bad?
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What if the Postal Service is not a choice?
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If not a perfect decision, how can we at least make a better one??
So, you shop somewhere. Or you buy a product you haven’t seen before. The business you just patronized thinks they have a “new customer” and they value this highly. Creating new customers is expensive, 7x more than retaining a customer. However, you get an email from the app saying, “We noticed you purchased X from Y. Did you know…"
You advise the merchant (or not) of your intent not to do further business w/them. A simple button press will do it.
Or, you can ask the app to examine a potential purchase, just as Evernote can clip, you could clip a potential page with your purchases teed up and get feedback in a few minutes on the implications of your purchases. Or right click on a product or brand in a browser.
Looking for a coffee shop? Let the app know. "Starbucks is right here, but I recommend a locally owned shop half a block further down." Pull into a local Exxon? "There is a locally-owned gas station that sources from Shell two blocks down."
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I have to choose regularly between shopping at Target and Walmart. I have no other options. I want quick and simple guidance, given my values. Are both equally bad? How can I know? What about Perkins versus Waffle House? Or Coke and Pepsi? Starbucks versus a local coffee shop?
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I don’t want to worry about making the best choice when I’m in the midst of a busy day. But I would be interested in getting feedback as to how I am doing. For example, what are the top 3 things I could stop buying (or places I could stop patronizing) to improve my score?
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I might be interested in various entertaining incentives (gamification). For example, if my decisions changed to route my money away from Koch Industries, I might get points to a "Koch-busters" leader-board. Winners of various leader boards would get coupons and discounts from more progressive retailers (such as featured in donegood.co).
In order to calculate a scalar credit rating, the application must be based on a clear set of values. Consumer credit ratings are based on a set of values such as "paying off debt reliably is good" and "seeking credit is bad." A basic set of values for this app might be:
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Human existence is a good thing
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The human race is worth saving
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We should seek the greatest good of the greatest number
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The UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights is a good starting point
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Education and freedom of the press are critical for democracy
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Global warming is an existential threat
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Wealth and income inequality have reached unacceptable ratios
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The US has an unpaid debt to its black citizens
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The human race thrives when women are empowered
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Racism, sexism, homophobia, and other forms of structural oppression are to be opposed
We are opposed to:
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The Republican Party of the US and its supporters
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Charles and David Koch and their political network
In order for the app to work, we will have to quantify these values. Additionally, the application could be parameterized - people can tune for non-core concerns. Personally, I consider gun control and animal rights to be non-core; I have seen both of these issues divide progressives too many times. In the US, we need to be able to make common cause on the environment with hunters. Ultimately, some credible steering committee would be required to steward the core values and how they are translated into an algorithm.
Personal note: I was involved with the early Green Party platform. This ultimately resulted in far too lengthy and non-actionable work. This app will not get bogged down in minutiae. In my view, there is great value in a simple set of core values, and diminishing value in extensive, speculative policy formulation. If possible, the app’s values should be based on existing value sets such as the UN UDHR.
As far as the SocialCredit app is concerned economic decisions, there are no singular fatal flaws for either the customer or the corporation. Reality is multi-dimensional and the aggregrate rating reflects a wide variety of concerns, just like your consumer credit rating is based on multiple factors. Scoring is weighted and aggregated with an algorithm. Just like a real credit rating. This is the only way we can help people w/decisions like "Target vs Wal-Mart." Target isn’t perfect, but in general it would score (e.g.) in the 600 range, while Wal-Mart is down around 450 (speculative examples).
If you were traveling through a small town and had to stop at the Wal-Mart, so be it. The trouble from a behavioral economics point of view is the lack of a counteracting nudge, reminding you that you want to do that as little as possible. This strategy of ongoing feedback and reinforcement, of closing the loop, is essential to the strategy.
Some will cringe at talk of credit ratings, marketing, social media, and apps. The argument is yes, we are using the master’s tools. We are turning the lemons we’ve been given (social alienation, the commodity society) into something better. Users control their own data and privacy with the app. Using it is not required.
Social screens are well understood. But many people don’t have money to invest. This app is more about daily economic decisions. Also, the concept of a "screen" is too binary. A screen is either pass or fail. We need a more nuanced approach, that aggregates various factors and accepts the fact that people’s choices are often limited. Ongoing course corrections towards a preferred end are preferable to all-or-nothing perfection. When the perfection strategy fails (as it always does), demoralization and passivity sets in.
The app is an always-on coach to help you make better economic decisions, reflecting both your social values and the realities of your life. It will be available as mobile, Web, and as an API (for other applications to build off of).
To generate the corporate social credit rating, we would use:
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social screening data from investing firms
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political contribution data
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voter scorecards
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interlocking directorate data (littlesis.org, whorulesamerica & similar data sets)
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legal (criminal & civil) and regulatory action data
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corporate and investment firm ownership (e.g. investment in companies profiting from the penal system)
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physical property ownership
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text analytics on news sites & social media sentiment
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mobile geolocation/geofencing
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voluntarily released tax information
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social and environmental audits
The consumer would also have a social credit rating, driven by their economic interactions with the corporations. To derive their social credit, we would examine their transactional activity:
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direct transactional data from their banks & credit cards (Quicken and many others have pioneered the techniques here)
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contactless e-receipts
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email (e.g. the way TripIt scans emails and harvests travel information)
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scanned documents
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aggregator sites such as Mint.com & Creditkarma
The application would be advertising-supported, with a sliding scale based on credit rating. An organization’s credit rating appears on their ad. Your local co-op probably can advertise for free. But we’ll take money from anyone, even Koch Enterprises with its score of 300. Anyone with a score that low pays proportionately, somewhere around ten thousand dollars an eyeball.
We believe that the opportunity is asymmetric. There will probably be a right wing copycat. But it will not be as numerous or effective. The economic weight of this country’s educated and progressive citizens will outweigh that of "Real Americans" who might actually favor supporting the Kochs financially.
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How to Measure Anything
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Nudge
need more on behavioral econ, neurosci, etc
Saw a Dykes to Watch Out For with Mo bemoaning how hard it was to keep track of what not to buy - searching for it
Possibility of introducing users to each other geographically — some kind of meetup to discuss local initiatives, purchasing issues, start coops, etc?
the wiki