This lever examines how investment decisions shape wealth distribution, analyzing both what drives inequality and how inequality feeds back into financial instability. This workstream establishes the foundational case for why current financial practices produce unequal outcomes and create systemic risks that affect even diversified portfolios.
Projects and Publications
Living at the crossroads: Affordability, Climate, and Real Estate
Mobilizing private capital is a central pillar of many governments’ affordable housing plans. But which investment approaches support affordability and climate goals - and which risk making them worse? PDI is pleased to be a co-founding member of the Taskforce on Affordable and Sustainable Housing (TASH). In this publication, we provide a preliminary assessment of the impacts that housing financialization is having on people and the planet in Europe.
Introducing the Taskforce on Inequality and Social-related Financial Disclosures
The new Taskforce on Inequality and Social-related Financial Disclosures (TISFD) aims to address the systemic risk posed by inequality by developing a global framework for managing social risks and opportunities. In this write-up of a recent P4P event, Pensions for Purpose explore TISFD's vision to foster stronger, more equitable societies, by integrating existing standards to provide a cohesive disclosure process for companies and investors, focusing on the economic and financial implications of inequality.
How workers sit at the heart of long-term value creation, and the case for multistakeholder governance and ownership
Sustainable Finance Geneva - Interview of the Month
Women Changing Finance podcast - How investment structures can reduce inequality and build long-term resilience
New Private Markets podcast - How can investors better understand and address inequality as a systemic risk?
The Geneva Connection - Society in Finance: Bridging Gaps, Shaping Futures
Value Creation Through Responsible Investing: NYU Stern Center for Sustainable Business Private Equity Sustainability Practicum: Value Creation Through Responsible Investing
Virtual Launch of the Taskforce on Inequality and Social-Related Financial Disclosures (TISFD)
Perspectives on Workforce Directors: Opportunities & Challenges
Accelerator for Systemic Risk Assessment (ASRA)- From Multidimensional Challenges to Multidimensional Possibilities: Facing Global Risks Together
UNRISD - Opportunities and Challenges for Integrating Thresholds and Allocations into Measurement and Management Frameworks
The Mindful Marketplace: Neighborhood Economics - Redefining Wealth Distribution with Innovative Financial Models
American Evaluation Association's Social Impact Measurement Topical Interest Group: Using a system lens to assess impact
Current Projects
Taskforce on Affordable and Sustainable Housing (TASH)
submitted feedback to the European Union as part of a call for evidence regarding the EU’s development of its first-ever affordable housing plan. The initiative aims to address the housing crisis affecting millions across Europe.The submission called on the EU Housing Taskforce and other relevant agencies, including the European Investment Bank (EIB) and the European Parliament, to incorporate these considerations to ensure the plan would truly deliver affordable, sustainable housing for all Europeans.
Past Projects
Taskforce on Inequality and Social-Related Financial Disclosures
The Predistribution Initiative, alongside a diverse coalition of partner organizations from 2021-2024, was part of the founding Working Group of the Taskforce on Inequality and Social-Related Financial Disclosures (TISFD) a global initiative to develop recommendations and guidance for businesses and financial institutions to understand and report on impacts, dependencies, risks, and opportunities (IDRO’s) related to people.
Formally launched in September 2024, PDI Executive Director Delilah Rothenberg now sits on the TISFD steering committee. This initiative is the result of the collective efforts of the TISFD Founding Partners, a global coalition of companies, financial institutions, labour, civil society, and international organizations, that believes in the fundamental need for businesses and capital providers to integrate people and society into decision-making, alongside climate and nature.
The TISFD envisions an economic and financial system in which businesses and financial institutions effectively address their IDRO’s related to people — resulting in fairer, stronger societies and economies.
To learn more about the TISFD and how to get involved, visit the TISFD website.
Investor Influence Project
The Investor Influence Project (formerly named Investor Contribution 2.0). This project takes an expansive view of the multifaceted ways investors shape outcomes for stakeholders and the natural environment and recommends that these considerations should be an embedded part of investors’ impact management approaches, recognizing that:
Investors’ activities can lead to both positive and negative changes in outcomes.
Investors can influence outcomes not only through their portfolio companies, but also through their own activities as a firm.
This influence can happen through several pathways, including addressing (or contributing to) system-level issues.
For those investors with the goal of positively changing outcomes experienced by stakeholders, this project also frames the importance of considering the extent to which the investor’s activities caused those changes in outcomes.
We are excited to share the products of this project, which we hope can be further refined through engagement with standard setters and piloting with investors and their stakeholders.
Whitepaper: The Investor Influence Whitepaper explores the potential for private equity, private debt, and venture capital investors to measure and manage their own activities and outcomes – expanding the lens from what has been traditionally and primarily focused on the effects of portfolio companies on social and environmental outcomes.
Tools: Additionally, for private capital asset classes, this project provides tools to measure, manage, and report on both intended positive impacts and potential unintended negative consequences of investors’ activities, aiming to equip investors with the resources needed to navigate their complex roles responsibly.
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