Dear New Yorkers,
As the stewards for the retirement savings of New York City’s public sector workers, the New York City Retirement Systems also serve as one of the largest institutional investors in the country. The pension funds play a powerful role as shareholders to hold companies accountable for creating long-term value for our beneficiaries and our communities.
As the 2022 shareholder proxy season heated up in recent months, the five New York City Retirement Systems engaged with companies we invest in on issues from workforce diversity to worker health and safety, to climate action.
Here are some of my favorite highlights from our recent shareholder advocacy:
Delivering Accountability for Amazon Workers
Amazon, the nation’s second largest employer, has a workforce of 1.6 million workers and how they treat those workers has a tremendous impact on our economy and communities. Together with New York State Comptroller Thomas P. DiNapoli and Illinois State Treasurer Michael Frerichs, I launched a “vote no” campaign to urge shareholders to vote against the reelection of key board directors who have overseen the company’s high injury rates, turnover, and violations of labor rights. Many of you joined that campaign and raised your voices to let Amazon’s board know that treating their workers right is essential to the company’s success.
Amazon’s independent shareholders voted 27% of their shares against the reelection of Judith McGrath, Chair of the Leadership Development and Compensation Committee – a stinging rebuke to her leadership on worker issues and a call to action for the company to change.
Addressing Climate Risk
One of my office’s highest priorities is addressing the clear and present risk climate change poses to our planet and our economy. Through direct engagement with energy companies General Electric, Duke Energy, and Dominion Energy, we reached agreements to provide investors with critical information on their lobbying activity and capital expenditure plans. Investors need and deserve this transparency so that we can assess their efforts as we transition to a low-carbon future. Read more about how this work fits into our office’s approach to financing a just transition here.
Fighting for Workforce Diversity
The Comptroller’s Office has long been a leader on workforce diversity. Since we began our initiative to get companies to disclose information to all investors in 2020, most S&P 100 companies have made publicly available their complete EEO-1 reports as submitted to the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission.
This proxy season, my office successfully engaged with 11 additional S&P 100 companies to reach agreements with their boards to disclose annual workforce diversity data. American Express, Anthem, Honeywell International, Illumina, Intuitive Surgical, Raytheon Technologies, Simon Property Group, Texas Instruments, The PNC Financial Services Group, T-Mobile, and Zoetis have committed to publish their EEO-1 reports annually. This brings the number of S&P 100 companies committing to these disclosures to 85.
Our engagement efforts have also led to agreements with Ford Motor Company and four leading financial services firms (BlackRock, JPMorgan Chase and Co., Morgan Stanley and The Goldman Sachs Group) to publicly disclose the self-identified gender, race, and/or ethnicity of individual board directors, as well as their skills and experience to investors.
The proxy season isn’t over yet, and the fight doesn’t end here. I’m committed to working toward an inclusive economy that works for everyone – because we all do better when we all do better. We’ll keep you posted on that work in the months ahead.
With gratitude,
Brad
P.S. You can read more about our office’s corporate governance and responsible investment work here.
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