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It didn’t take long for some to conflate the Silicon Valley Bank collapse with “woke capitalism,” which, for those of you who don’t know, refers to investing with an emphasis on social and environmental concerns over simply maximizing profits.

It is seen by some as misguided. So much so that our legislators want to write laws preventing companies that employ this kind of investment strategy from doing business with the government.

It is far easier to get folks worked up over social issues then it is to get them excited about policy. The happy culture warrior gladly goes into battle over the demise of family values rather then a substantive discussion on how best to provide childcare to a family that needs two incomes in order to survive.

Silicon Valley Bank’s failure had nothing to do with their supposed disproportionate concern over diversity or misguided environmental investments. The bank failed because of a bad, short-sighted investment strategy compounded by poor financial management.

Let’s not let our political leaders off the hook and distract us with rants about wokeness. What happened to Silicon Valley Bank was more about the need for better policy, oversight and regulation then it was about environmental, social or governance issues.

Alec Frank

Wilkes-Barre