“It’s in people’s self-interest to try to contain this,” says Rosanna Landis Weaver, wage justice and executive pay program senior manager at As You Sow, a non-profit shareholder-advocacy group. “The political instability that is created by income inequality is a real danger. It’s a danger to democracy, and it’s a danger to capitalism.” Read More →
Read More“I am a capitalist. I’m for improving capitalism, not throwing it out,” says As You Sow’s Weaver. “It’s in people’s self-interest to try to contain this—because the political instability that is created by income inequality is a real danger. It’s a danger to democracy, and it’s a danger to capitalism.” Read More →
Read MoreAndrew Behar, CEO of As You Sow, a non-profit that tracks how well companies live up to their environmental and social pledges, isn’t convinced that BlackRock will do anything differently this time. He charges that companies like BlackRock hide behind the “it’s in an index” excuse. Read More →
Read More“Their current financial statements don’t truly take climate risk into account,” said Danielle Fugere, president of the shareholder advocacy group As You Sow. “They are looking at significant growth of fossil fuel assets and fossil fuel demand over the next two or three decades. What happens to your business if we are successful in meeting the net-zero goals that we set in Paris? How many write- offs are there? What happens to your asset retirement obligations?” Read More →
Read MoreTo quickly find out any fund’s gun exposure, you can consult a website called Gun Free Funds, maintained by As You Sow, a nonprofit shareholder advocacy group, and partially powered by Morningstar. Simply input a fund name and get the fund’s exposure to gun manufacturers and major gun retailers, along with replacement recommendations for those funds with exposure to guns. Read More →
Read More"It’s amazing how much power people have in their money, in their savings, in their 401(k) plans," says Andrew Behar, CEO of As You Sow, a nonprofit that promotes corporate social responsibility through shareholder advocacy. "It really just comes down to: Do you want to profit off of assault weapons, handguns, and ammunition? If you don’t, you need to know what you own." Read More →
Read MoreThere are now many E.S.G.-based alternatives to popular index funds that screen out gun-related stocks with minimal effects on performance or costs, Mr. Hale said. Online tools like Gun Free Funds, run by the nonprofit foundation As You Sow, give information about gun stocks in funds that appear in many investors’ portfolios and retirement accounts. Read More →
Read MoreWhile the new rules will affect most funds, including index funds, their target is ESG funds which drew a record $649 billion globally through Nov. 30, up from $542 billion and $285 billion in 2020 and 2019, respectively, according to Refinitiv Lipper data. Andrew Behar, president of climate-activist group, As You Sow, said market participants have exploited a loophole in the current rules when naming funds. Read More →
Read MoreFor instance a fund based on the S&P 500 ESG Index, the SPDR S&P 500 ESG ETF, received the low rating "D" by climate activist research group As You Sow, which noted despite its title and sustainability mandate, fossil fuel stocks make up 6.5% of fund assets. Read More →
Read MoreTesla was recently tagged by sustainable investing advocate As You Sow in a report that ranked 55 companies on their “green” progress.
Most major corporations tell customers and shareholders they’re working toward zero greenhouse gas emissions in the coming years and decades, doing their part to slow global warming. But the speed of progress varies. And many still rely on buying permission to pollute through carbon offsets rather than changing how they source energy, the As You Sow investing group charged. Others, even environmental groundbreaker Tesla, earned poor marks for not publicly sharing emissions data at all. Read More →
Read MoreKelly McBee, waste program coordinator at As You Sow, answers this question and others to help peel back the filmy layers that cloud companies’ sustainability stories and bring more clarity. As You Sow advocates for environmental and social corporate responsibility on behalf of companies’ shareholders. Read More →
Read MoreFor example, AT&T shareholders voted against an executive compensation measure in April. In 2021, 16 companies had executive pay packages rejected by shareholders, according to As You Sow, an activist investor group. Read More →
Read MoreBut while such companies may be low-carbon in the future, they are high-carbon today, said Andrew Behar, CEO of As You Sow, a Berkeley, Calif.-based non-profit shareholder advocacy organization that promotes environmental and social responsibility. "Many are also expanding fossil fuel operations at the same time as investing in renewables," Mr. Behar said in an email.
Read More“They are holding a steady course. That hasn’t always been the case when we see a price spike. I think that is good news and a sign of how much the transition is impacting companies,” said Danielle Fugere, president and chief counsel of As You Sow, a nonprofit that advocates for socially responsible investing Read More →
Read MoreAccording to an SEC filing, 91.36 percent of the votes cast at the company’s recent AGM backed a proposal filed by As You Sow asking that Boeing’s board release a report ‘evaluating and disclosing if and how the company has met the criteria of the net-zero indicator, including Scope 3 use of product emissions, or whether it intends to revise its policies to be fully responsive to such [an] indicator.’ Read More →
Read MoreAs You Sow, the nonprofit that submitted the two shareholder resolutions at Caterpillar, said it supported companies experimenting with different ways of reducing environmental impacts but hopes the company will disclose more about its efforts. Read More →
Read MoreAs the abortion debate intensifies, some corporate activists are urging companies to take prompt action to adopt more favorable reproductive rights policies ahead of any action by the Supreme Court. “Right now, it’s a ripple, but it will become a wave, and once Roe is overturned, it will become a tsunami,” said Andrew Behar, CEO of As You Sow, a non-profit shareholder organization. Read More →
Read MoreAltogether, Berkshire faced four shareholder proposals. One, led by Federated Hermes (FHI) on behalf of other shareholders, asked Berkshire to publish an annual assessment of how it manages physical and transitional climate-change-related risks and opportunities. It won 27% of the overall vote, or around 47% of the vote excluding insiders. A second, led by shareholder advocate As You Sow, asked Berkshire to report on its greenhouse gas emissions. It also won 27% of the overall vote. A third, also led by As You Sow, asked Berkshire or its holding companies to report on the outcomes of their DEI efforts by publishing data on workforce composition and promotion rates by gender, race, and ethnicity. It won 26% of the vote. The board of directors recommended voting against the proposals. Read More →
Read MoreDanielle Fugere, the president of As You Sow, a shareholder representative organization promoting environmental and social corporate responsibility, wrote in Sierra, the magazine of the Sierra Club, that the SEC's rules "represent an important step forward in terms of using market mechanisms to spur progress on climate action." ("What Do the New SEC Rules Mean for Action on Climate Change?" March 24, 2022.) Read More →
Read MoreAs You Sow, a shareholder advocacy nonprofit, raises awareness among the public about this irony, primarily using a suite of online tools to help people find out what their companies are investing their earnings in. It’s especially important when that doesn’t align with citizens’ increasing concerns about social and environmental causes. The organization hopes it can “trigger an emotional response” to get them to effect change in company policies. “People simply don’t know that their money is being invested in companies that are destroying their future,” says CEO Andrew Behar. Read More →
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