Before we get into this, I want to make some things as clear as possible.  First, I am not an investment professional.  I am not going to give you specific investment advice.  What I am doing here is telling my story that you may or may not find instructive.  Your financial situation is unlikely to be the same as mine. But I do feel safe in saying that you should do your research, become an educated investor, so that you know why you are doing what you’re doing with your retirement savings.

Over the last several years, I’ve become sensitized to the impacts our government and economy has on the environment.  In particular, I’ve become horrified how our state Legislature is beholden to oil and gas interests and continually hands out subsidies and favorable treatment to an industry sector that routinely does not return the love, i.e., screws up our landscape and health at every opportunity.  It seems like the history of Pennsylvania repeats.  First we chop down all the forests and erode our soils.  Then we dig out the coal and leave flooded mines and mine spoil. Then we drill for oil (160 years ago) and leave uncapped wells, poisoned land, and petrochemical spills. Now, it’s fracking and we face a future of abandoned and badly managed well pads, spewing methane into the atmosphere.  But, I digress.

In some states, public pension funds are divesting from fossil fuel companies.  These decisions are driven by public outcry over environmental pollution and a warming planet caused by CO2.  There is also a sense that these companies are going to fare poorly in the decarbonized future and may be losing concerns in the long run.  In the news a few weeks ago, Exxon wrote down the value of its natural gas properties by something like $17-20b, which even for a behemoth like Exxon is real money.

Unlike other state Pension systems, like CalPERS, the Oregon Investment Council, the Washington State Investment Board, and the New York City Pension Funds, our state pension fund, PSERS, does not have a policy with regard to social investing, commonly known as ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance).  Given its existence as a political football and alternatively controlled and manhandled by the Legislature, it was unlikely that PSERS would adopt an ESG philosophy.  

It gets worse.  Our good friends at the US Department of Labor feel considering the social impacts in public and private pension fund management would be wrong, somehow.  They recently finalized a rule that essentially blocks ERISA pension plans from considering ESG criteria in investment decisions. I suspect it will be reversed in the new Administration, but ESG got some troll’s attention at Labor.  To paraphrase Churchill, this Administration can always be trusted to do the wrong thing, once all other possibilities have been exhausted.

For me, the bad news was that my pension fund was likely to stay strictly in the Milton Friedman universe of maximized profits and zero social responsibility.  The good news was that I might have some control over other retirement funds, which are separate from the pension fund. So, if I have some control, what exactly does that mean?  More importantly, what do I want?

ESG Primer

ESG is a set of standards for evaluating a company’s operations.  According to Investopia:

Environmental, social, and governance (ESG) criteria are a set of standards for a company’s operations that socially conscious investors use to screen potential investments. Environmental criteria consider how a company performs as a steward of nature. Social criteria examine how it manages relationships with employees, suppliers, customers, and the communities where it operates. Governance deals with a company’s leadership, executive pay, audits, internal controls, and shareholder rights.

ESG investing, therefore, is an approach to investing that takes these three criteria into account when making decisions in whom to place your money with.  The origins of ESG investing are only about 60-70 years old.  The main philosophy toward investing was and still is a focus on the bottom line, the Milton Friedman bottom line cited above. However, beginning in the 1950’s and 1960’s  other criteria than the bottom line started creeping in.  One of the most memorable was whether funds should participate in supporting Apartheid in South Africa.  In 1977, Reverend Leon Sullivan, a member of the board of General Motors, drafted a set of principles to apply economic pressure on South Africa, principles that latter become known as the Sullivan Principles.  The Principles essentially demanded that a company provide equal treatment to workers regardless of race. 

By the turn of this century, more institutions have taken a ESG approach, weighing factors for investment beyond simply bottom line.  One of the more compelling reasons for ESG investing is that a company that considers environmental, social, and governance factors in its operations might not maximize profit in the short term, but might be less susceptible to bad outcomes that can strike, such as the BP Oil Spill, or Liberty University and the Jerry Falwell scandal. ESG investing might not scrape the last dollar out of an operation, but it might be the most sustainable and profitable in the long term.

Furthermore, the risks to companies that do not plan for the upcoming climate crisis are likely to face those bad outcomes sooner than later.  Maybe, it’s something in the water, but on today’s news feeds, there’s an article on how investors are up in revolt at Exxon over it future investments, seeking a greater stake in renewable energy.

Blackrock CEO Larry Fink just stated that, “climate change has become a defining factor in companies’ long-term prospects … But awareness is rapidly changing, and I believe we are on the edge of a fundamental reshaping of finance.”  Now Blackrock is an investment firm, but saying Blackrock is an investment firm is like saying the New York Yankees are a baseball club.  Blackrock is the world’s largest investment manager, with $25 trillion under its control. 

Across the pond, in the UK, an inquest into the death of a 9-year old girl found that illegal air pollution contributed to her death.  One wonders if those responsible will be held accountable.

And in a non-environmental cautionary tale, two members of the Sackler family are going to appear before Congress, no doubt to be grilled on their role in promoting addicting drugs like Oxycontin.  Their company, Purdue Pharma is in bankruptcy, being kept alive long enough to pay out settlements to injured parties.  I could not find out what its stock price was in 2000, but Purdue Pharma had sold $35b in Oxycontin alone by 2017 after its introduction in 1995.  I suspect investors that followed the Friedman rule were quite happy, until the stock tanked, mired in controversy.

Defunding Fossil Fuel Companies

Most of you who have read my bio know that I am retired from State Service, and no longer working for a living.  My wife, who also spent her career with the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and I depend on monthly pensions for income.  We are fortunate that in addition to our pensions, we set up 457b accounts – the governmental equivalents of 401k’s.  The money in those accounts are not expected to be needed for a while and at age 68, we do not need to take disbursements from them for several years.

That being said, I’ve wondered what that money is doing and whether it is doing any good beyond building a nest egg.  I am not alone.  Boomers make up 21% of the US population, but control more than half of the nation’s wealth. Unfortunately, much of that wealth is concentrated, such that the median boomer has only $144,000 saved for retirement.  Wealth inequality deserves its own column, but it will be another day.  In any case, most of us have something saved in a retirement account, doing god knows what.

Money is power, and the money tied up in these retirement accounts represents a lot of collective power.  For those of us who have control over our investments, we face choices on how that money is working.  Do we put it into casino and tobacco stocks?  Do we, like my mother and her generation, keep it in government bonds?  Do we buy unicorn futures?  Do we even know, especially since many of us have chosen algorithm-driven balanced funds or target date funds.  We let the machines do the thinking.

The Escape Hatch

(or the Trap Door depending on which way you are going)

457b funds behave much like traditional IRAs.  You put the money in pre-tax, it accrues value (hopefully). When you withdraw these funds, then you pay income tax on the growth.  They are attractive because they can grow pre-tax.  So, my 457b funds (from Pennsylvania and a smaller fund from Maryland) are safely tucked away pre-tax.  Within the Pennsylvania fund program, administered by PSERS, the Pennsylvania State Employee Retirement System, there are investment choices. Same in the Maryland MSRP, Maryland Teachers and State Employees Supplemental Retirement Plans.  Most of the Pennsylvania choices are plain vanilla, as they should be.  No unicorn futures here. There are a skein of retirement date funds, from 2025 to 2065 (at which time I would be 113).  There are several stock index funds, for small to large US companies, a bond fund, and a Stable Value Fund (read Mattress).  None of these provide ESG options.  Again, plain vanilla. But I do like vanilla.

Hiding in the corner is a Schwab Self-Directed Brokerage Account.  Huh? What’s this? They explain it is a self-directed account that lets me select from numerous mutual funds and exchange-traded funds, which aren’t offered through the regular PSERS agent.  Best of all, any funds sent to Schwab stays within the 457b fence, meaning it won’t be taxed until it is withdrawn.  Apparently, moving funds to another brokerage within this system is OK.  My PSERS managers handle the transfer to Schwab and mark it in the books as staying within the 457b.  Schwab gets the money and I direct investments in their website, but it hasn’t left the 457b. I feel like Alice looking through the looking glass.  Or maybe Groucho trying to get into the speakeasy.  In either metaphor. I am on one side of the world and this magical place exists on the other.  I wonder if they have unicorn futures?

On the entry door is the fine print:

The Schwab PCRA is for knowledgeable investors who acknowledge and understand the risks associated with many of the investment choices available through PCRA. PCRA is designed for individuals who seek more flexibility, increased diversification, and a greater role in managing their retirement savings.

At least that’s more warning than you get entering the speakeasy, or the casino. I am knowledgeable only to the degree that I want to explore ESG investments, or more specifically to purge my portfolio from CO2.  Usually, that and 3 bucks will get you a cup of coffee.

I gingerly enter, and discover that it is a speakeasy, but the cocktail of the month is ESG.  Schwab, it seems, is interested in your money and in that regard is a total agnostic.  When I first bumped into this company, my initial assumption was that the originator of this eponymously named company was the Charles Schwab of Bethlehem Steel fame. That was Charles M. Schwab.  Our Schwab is Charles R., a California boy, still among us. The only irony is that I am using the company he founded to invest in things I doubt he would support.  He is a big Trump supporter and for other conservative Republican causes.  But I appreciate his agnosticism when it comes to investing.

The list of ESG funds runs to 8 pages, single spaced, two columns, and includes mutual funds and ETFs.  Many of them are mirror images of the funds in the PSERS lists, only like non-fat milk, remove the objectionable parts, whether it be fossil fuels, or tobacco, or gun manufacturers, or whatever. Sadly, I never found the unicorn futures fund.  Probably for the best.  I needed to order a cocktail with something better than rainbows.

If you are looking for specifics and numbers, I will disappoint you.  First, they aren’t relevant to this post. Secondly, as I said in the beginning, everyone’s situation is different and what works for me probably doesn’t work for you.  In any case, I took all of the money in my Maryland and Pennsylvania 457b’s and spilled it onto the table.  Had to unfold some of the bills, put the Euro’s in a separate bucket, and pick up some of the loose change that spilled onto the floor.  Once order had been restored to the table, I divided the pile in two. Half was going to stay with the existing Maryland and Pennsylvania managers; half was going to Schwab. The half that stayed was largely bonds and fixed income instruments, with low risk.  The half that was going to Schwab was the more aggressive stock funds.  Within the Schwab ESG lists, I found a a large cap stock ETF (A), a small cap stock ETF (B), something called a global clean energy ETF (C), and an international ETF (D).  I’ll spare you the specific names of the funds, but they all have desirable attributes by either including “good” companies or excluding “bad” companies.

Fund	Fund Profile	Includes	Excludes
A	US stock companies	ESG Criteria	excludes stocks of certain companies in the following industries: adult entertainment, alcohol, tobacco, weapons, fossil fuels, gambling, and nuclear power.companies that do not meet standards of U.N. global compact principles and companies that do not meet certain diversity criteria
B	US small cap companies	adhere to predetermined ESG, controversial business involvement and low-carbon screening criteria
C	Global clean energy companies	based on the WilderHill New Energy Global Innovation Indexcompanies worldwide whose innovative technologies focus on clean energy, renewables, decarbonization, and efficiency
D	International small, medium, and large cap companies	Screened for certain environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG) criteria	companies in the following industries: adult entertainment, alcohol, tobacco, weapons, fossil fuels, gambling, and nuclear power.*companies that do not meet certain standards of U.N. global compact principles and companies that do not meet certain diversity criteria.*

All in all, it took about a week to set up the Schwab accounts and transfer the funds and purchase the ETFs.  There were no extra charges in doing this, other than the ongoing charges to each fund, which would be accrued within the Maryland and Pennsylvania managers or within Schwab. I hope by now, you understand that I am not a day trader. I’ll leave the trading up to the fund managers.  In any case, I am not inclined to review these choices more than once or twice a year.  Set it and forget it. I hope to not need any of these funds for at least 3 years and possibly longer, so this is ultimately a longer term investment strategy.  I might or might not provide a performance report in 2024.

Take-Aways

1. If you have a retirement fund or are saving in a retirement fund, you should become familiar with the basics of retirement investing and know what your goals are.
2. If your company or the fund provides you with basic investing training or course, take it.  You should know generally why you have picked the funds you have.
3. Now we come to the main point: Ask yourself this question.  Do I have any social responsibility in investing, or is my sole goal to maximize my profit?  Do I agree with Milton Friedman, or do I believe that companies and by extension, I, have some responsibilities to the public square that requires additional considerations?  If you need some research to be able to answer that question, you can read this article from Nerdwallet.
4. If you do believe there is a social aspect to pension funds and investing, and you have a retirement fund that you control, then you may wish to do additional research into ESG investing and determine if there are better funds for your investments.  Better in this case, means not just returns but the ESG principles described above.  And since not all ESG funds have the identical objectives, more research is warranted.
5. If you’ve made it this far and have a retirement fund and/or are saving toward retirement, consider yourself lucky, and smart.  A fourth of Americans have no retirement savings or pension.

Good luck, all and thank you for you patience on this one.

Why Anthropology is Critical to Our Nation

So Many Crises

The pandemic has changed our lives in many different ways, but I think it’s enduring impact will be on our language.  Before March, who had heard of Zoom, let alone “zoomed” a call.  No one other than CDC had been thinking about pandemics, at least not in a 100 years.  COVID-19, or just plain COVID, is now the shorthand excuse for any behavior not previously considered normal. As in, “Why are you going to the grocery store at 2 AM?” “COVID.”  “Honey, why is our liquor bill tripled this month?” “COVID” And so on.

In this COVID year, our language has evolved to handle the moment. It always does.  One term that has especially come to the fore is “essential worker.”  Well, just what is an essential worker? Homeland Security has conveniently provided us with a formal definition. 

However, in this 19-page definition, I am hard-pressed to identify a non-essential worker.  So to fall back on common sense, maybe we can define an essential worker as someone who does a job that the society really can’t do without, that if they weren’t doing this job, somehow the whole infrastructure of our country would fray and fall apart.  I’m OK with that definition, because it includes the workers at the meat processing plants (sorry, vegetarians).  It includes police, nurses, your dry cleaner, folks who mail out your credit card, your handy (Ace is the Place) hardware guy, now person, and your local school’s lunch lady, now person.   It does not include athletes, stationers, florists, philosophers, or anthropologists.  Which is a shame and a mark of governmental short-sightedness.  Ten months into this pandemic, I could use a greeting card, some flowers, a football game, and some understanding of what it all means. Am I alone?

COVID isn’t the only large problem we face today.  Before and after this pandemic is over, we have faced and will face economic problems of income inequality and income inequality’s children, hunger and homelessness.  There is the 400-year legacy of systemic racism to be addressed.  The planet is burning up.  Some of these are more existential than others, but all are crises and all need our attention.  We have conveniently defined essential workers for the COVID crisis, but shouldn’t we also be defining essential workers for these other crises, too?

Anthropology as an Essential Degree

I am biased as all three of my college degrees are in Anthropology, even though I specialized in archaeology.  I find that anthropology has served me well in navigating my world over the last 50 years and has given me the tools to process and address the current crisis listed above.

What is anthropology?  Here is Wikipedia’s response:

Anthropology is the scientific study of humanity, concerned with human behavior, human biology, and societies, in both the present and past, including past human species.

The American Anthropological Association’s definition is a bit deeper.

Within these definitions, I believe are some key concepts, building blocks, if you will.  First, anthropology is a scientific pursuit, meaning it relies on observation and evidence for testing hypotheses.  Anthropology is an observation-driven discipline, with data gathered through fieldwork (in both cultural anthropology and archaeology, and often in physical anthropology).  Good anthropology requires engagement with the world, to the degree that we’ve coined the term “armchair anthropologist” as a form of derision, equivalent to calling someone a dilettante (although there is a functional difference).

Another building block is the concept of culture.  While there are as many different definitions of culture as there are cultural anthropologists, I think we can again find the nut of the matter as culture involves shared beliefs within a society that is passed down through learning, or as one of my old text books states:

A system of shared beliefs, values, customs, behaviors, and artifacts that the members of a society use to cope with one another and with their world and that are transmitted from generation to generation through learning. (Daniel G. Bates and Fred Plog. 1990 Cultural Anthropology. Third edition. McGraw-Hill, Inc. New York.)

The third building block is the understanding that the human experience encompasses diversity in terms of culture.  There are a lot of ways to skin a cat and a lot of ways cultures address similar problems.  This diversity permeates social and political organization, economies,  language, belief systems, and how we physically adapt to our environment.  One size does not fit all.  When a politician argues that free-market economics is the natural and only way, we tend to point to successful pre-market and non-market examples.  When someone in the room says, “everyone thinks the same,” we duck and cover.  When clergy talk of universals in religious behavior, of what is natural and right, we point to other religious systems, drop the mike, and leave.  Anthropology makes us naturally contrarian, but at least we know dogma when we see it.

Studying cultures from an anthropological perspective forces you to consider the interdependency of the various parts of the culture, how the social system is connected to the economic system; how religious beliefs affect language and vice versa.  Over the years, the terms to describe the interconnectedness have changed, from organic, to functional, to holistic, to systems, but they all convey the same idea that to understand part of the culture, you need to also understand the whole.

The fifth building block is a bit more elusive, but I believe it to be the understanding of the difference between the emic and the etic, especially as it affects our understanding of our own culture and how we operate within it.  An emic viewpoint is from within the culture, seeing the activities of the group from the culture’s own perspective. An etic viewpoint is viewing a culture from outside of it, using those comparative or objective standards of anthropological science.  Anthropologists look at culture from both perspectives but it is the methodology of looking from within and looking from without that is special to anthropology.  From a practical standpoint, when we drink the Kool-Aid, we know that we are drinking it.

Anthropology is a study of cultures, of societies, of groups of humans, not of individual humans.  We are social creatures and have evolved as such.  Almost always, we will look at the group behavior before looking at the individual behavior, and even when looking at the individual behavior, we reference it to the group.

As an archaeologist, a subset discipline within anthropology within the United States, anthropology affords us a time depth missing in other social sciences.  We can build on the written historical record by using the material cultural remains of a society.  What is left in the ground are facts that are not bound by the emic interpretations of that society.  We can’t interview peoples no longer present on the earth, but we can listen to their stuff.  Archaeologists also have a special take on systems, understanding that what we see as a system is a snapshot in time and not necessarily immutable.

With Regard to COVID

Back to COVID.  Anthropology has prepared me for responding to the COVID crisis in several ways.  First, the respect for science lets me acknowledge that this is a novel virus and that medical science will guide the best public health response.  Even the concept of public health is one that we can grasp fairly quickly.

From the CDC website:

Public health is “the science and art of preventing disease, prolonging life, and promoting health through the organized efforts and informed choices of society, organizations, public and private communities, and individuals.” — CEA Winslow

For us, it appears to be just applied medical anthropology, i.e., using the methods of medical science applied holistically to a society, understanding how the society will understand and accept or at least react to those applications, and finding the best ways to foster those informed choices.

I believe most anthropologists would look at the last 11 months and our government’s response to the pandemic and shake their heads.  The politicization of the crisis, even down to wearing masks, brings its own special problem, one that must address the belief systems of nearly half of the population that is unwilling to embrace public health guidance, where it exists.  Our future and our lives depend on getting the 30% of Americans who aren’t worried about getting the virus and the 40% who believe that the current Administration is doing a good job responding to the Pandemic to adjust their behaviors going forward.

First, while we can expect an effective vaccine to be widely available by the middle of next year, it won’t be worth a damn if most people don’t take it. The WHO estimates are that 60-70% of a population needs to be vaccinated to develop herd immunity, which will protect those unable to take a vaccine as well as the rest of us, and offer a chance to stamp out the outbreak.  However, current polling indicates that less than half of Americans are willing to get the vaccine as soon as its available.  Applied medical anthropology is the best means we have available to advise public health officials to encourage all segments of the society to get vaccinated, including those dis-inclined.

Secondly, until the vaccine is widely available, the troika of masks, social distancing, and washing of hands could greatly reduce the current outbreak.  Yet in many communities, these simple and effective actions are viewed with scorn. If everyone took the mask mandate seriously, we could probably save a third of the expected deaths between September and February of next year.

Much has been written about what not to do with regard to masks and social distancing, i.e., don’t directly challenge individuals, don’t tell them they’re wrong, don’t scold.  However, not much has been written about what to do and this is where anthropologists, applying their craft can help change behaviors, if not beliefs.

We will need medical anthropologists now more than before to advise the public health leaders on change behavior.  Necessary, but not easy.

With Regard to Income Inequality and the “K” Economic Recovery

An economic anthropologist would have no problem understanding that the US economy has essentially two tracks, one for the well-off and one for everyone else.  One for the stock market, and one for the unemployed and underemployed.  Therefore, it would be no surprise that the so-called recovery of the US economy following the pandemic’s entry would be two-tiered, or the so-called “K” recovery.

Our economic anthropologist would understand the economic sub-cultures that exist in our society and be as concerned with food insecurity as price-to-earnings ratios.  They would understand that the unemployment rate doesn’t include individuals who have stopped looking for work because their sector has dried up.  And our economic anthropologist would see the inequalities built into our current free-market economy, whether it be in housing, education, job opportunities, advancement, diet, or health.

Finally, our economic anthropologist would systemically understand that the economic recovery is wholly dependent on addressing the pandemic, instead of arguing for two tracks or one versus the other.  The two are systemically interconnected.

A harsh eye on what is happening today doesn’t necessarily offer the solutions, which have ranged from neglect to state control and everything in between. Without understanding the problem, there really can’t be an effective solution.  (Hint: we have seen what neglect has brought us through the continued inaction of Congress.  Maybe we should try something different.)  And finally, the systemic nature of culture would inform us that when many people can’t put a roof over their head and/or worry about how they are going to get the next meal for their families, other parts of society, including institutions, belief systems, government, etc, are all going to be affected, and not in a good way.  And as a final editorial flourish, folks are tempted to think about the collapse of society fueled by socialists and anarchists tearing things down.  This certainly was the Republican message during the elections.  While this does occasionally happen (see Russia 1917), the more common model is an attack from the right and a push toward authoritarian control (see Germany 1933).  Militias, not mobs.  Never a good look for a democracy.

With Regard to Race

Race is a social construct. It does not exist as a biological fact.  Again, to be clear. Race is a social construct. It does not exist as a biological fact.  And thank you, Franz Boaz for that clear message, and for demolishing Madison Grant’s arguments of The Passing the the Great Race a hundred years ago, even though Grant’s ideas still have currency today.

I could spend several blogs talking about race, but much useful stuff has been written lately and I don’t feel the need to review the landscape.  My training as an anthropologist has allowed me the frame to see the concept of race for what it is and isn’t.  It has also taught me to react when I hear phrases such as “All lives matter,” “they do ____ naturally” or “it’s in their blood,” “I’m not a racist,” “some of my best friends are ____,” etc.

It took 400 years to get into where we are with regard to race relations and systemic racism. We aren’t going to get out quickly or easily.  But until we understand the problem(s), we aren’t going anywhere.  Anthropologists could be useful guides in that journey.

With Regard to the Climate Crisis

Finally, to the elephant in the room, the burning planet. Conrad Kottak, a cultural anthropologist has defined ecological anthropology as how cultural beliefs and practices helped human populations adapt to their environments, and how people used elements of their culture to maintain their ecosystems.  Well, as a species we certainly had adapted to our environment, but this adaptation has spun out of control and our behavior of emitting too much carbon dioxide is rapidly leading us to soil our nest.  We haven’t maintained our prime ecosystem, the earth, and we need to quickly change our behaviors.

Anthropologists understand the ecological implications of too much CO2 and what it is doing to our planet. Anthropologists can help societies devise social responses to adapt to our ecosystems so much less CO2 is emitted. It’s one thing to look at the burning Amazon rainforest and say that it’s no good. It’s quite another to understand the underlying economic and social drivers of that burning and to help the Brazilian economy reward its Amazonian occupants with something other than what can be earned from cleared forests.

The solutions to the climate crisis are going to require multi-faceted approaches that need to systemically interact.  We can’t just stop driving gas-powered cars and say we’re done.  People laugh at the Green New Deal as something beyond the climate crisis, but what the Green New Deal gets right is that it understands the linkage between the economy and the environment.  I recently heard a commentator state that our economy depends on fixing the climate crisis in the same way that our economy depends in the short term on ending the COVID pandemic.  They are interlinked and inseparable.

Anthropology as the Basis for Learning

Anthropology is the one field that brings together a toolkit for addressing our major crises, a toolkit comprising a scientific approach, a concept of culture, an understanding of diversity amongst peoples on the planet, an appreciation of the systemic interrelationship of different aspects of our society, a method of observation that allows us to simultaneously look from without and from within, and a moral foundation that recognizes we are social animals and all that goes with it.

The US does not need 330 million professional anthropologists.  However, I do believe we would all be better served if we started teaching this toolkit in elementary schools and encouraged specialists to get foundational training in anthropology before going off to their preferred discipline, whether it be economics, law, public policy, ecology, or medicine.  Anthropology could be the essential degree to prepare us to face our current and future crises.