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The Case for Investing More in People

Harvard Business Review

.” There is a virtuous cycle between productivity and people: Higher levels of productivity allow society to reinvest in human capital (most obviously, though not exclusively, via higher wages), and smart investments result in higher labor productivity. Unfortunately, this virtuous cycle appears to be broken. And wages are stagnant.

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The Comprehensive Business Case for Sustainability

Harvard Business Review

Today’s executives are dealing with a complex and unprecedented brew of social, environmental, market, and technological trends. Yet executives are often reluctant to place sustainability core to their company’s business strategy in the mistaken belief that the costs outweigh the benefits. . Fostering innovation.

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Even for Companies, the U.S. Is Split Between Haves and Have-Nots

Harvard Business Review

Companies in the top one-fifth of profitability earn, in aggregate, about 70 times more economic profit (accounting profit less cost of capital) than those in the middle three-fifths combined, according to McKinsey’s database of 3,000 large, publicly listed, nonfinancial U.S. Consider what’s happening among corporations.

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The Real Reasons Companies Are So Focused on the Short Term

Harvard Business Review

This has been a remarkable year for the markets. Some argue that profits are stagnant because of short-termism—that decades of focusing on current profits over long-run innovativeness has resulted, now, in companies that are hollowed out. MirageC/Getty Images. The S&P and the Dow indexes are up 18% and 19%, respectively.