Income and Work

Investors and advocates called on McDonald's to end subminimum wages for tipped workers and to treat payment of a living wage as a human right.

With One Fair Wage (advocacy partner, not an investor filer)

Result: This was an investor and advocacy engagement, not a proxy shareholder vote; no vote result applies.

McDonald's left the National Restaurant Association. ICCR and other observers linked the departure to McDonald's public criticism of the association's subminimum-wage advocacy, though neither organization confirmed that this was the specific cause.

Shareholders Commend McDonald's Commitment to End Subminimum Wages as Model for Restaurant Industry, ICCR

Asked Amazon's board to commission an independent third-party assessment of how the company's use of artificial intelligence, including algorithmic productivity quotas, affects the human rights and safety of Amazon's own workforce, including warehouse workers.

Result: Proposal failed; exact vote percentage not confirmed in the sources retrieved for this research. Filed under SEC Rule 14a-8.

we found no documented change confirmed in the sources retrieved.

At Amazon's Annual Meeting, Investors Continue to Raise Significant Risks to Workers and the Environment, Interfaith Center on Corporate Responsibility (ICCR)

Asked Dollar Tree's board to produce a report on wages and inequality, after finding that median associate pay ($13,490 a year) fell below the federal poverty threshold for a single person.

Result: Put to a vote at the June 13, 2023 annual meeting; Dollar Tree's board recommended shareholders vote against it. We could not confirm the exact vote count in the sources reviewed.

We found no documented change directly attributed to this proposal. Retail TouchPoints reported that Dollar Tree separately announced plans to raise average wages by about $2 an hour around the same period, but the source does not establish that this increase was a response to the shareholder proposal.

Dollar General, Dollar Tree Come Under Activist Investor Fire for Workforce Issues, Retail TouchPoints

Asked Tesla's board to report on whether and how it would eliminate child labor and forced labor, including cobalt mining risk in the Democratic Republic of Congo and concerns about Uyghur forced labor in China, from its supply chain by 2025, and to increase supply-chain transparency.

Result: Per Tesla's own SEC Form 8-K, the proposal received 0 votes for and 2,420,047,519 votes against (100% against). This was a 'floor' proposal not included in Tesla's advance proxy materials or on shareholders' proxy ballots, which is why the recorded 'for' vote was zero.

Despite the zero-vote outcome, CEO Elon Musk publicly committed at the meeting to third-party audits of Tesla's cobalt supply chain ('we will conduct a third-party audit... we'll put a webcam on the mine'). As of a July 2024 Forbes report, the follow-through fell short of that promise: Tesla's main cobalt supplier posted only a single low-resolution monthly satellite photo of the mine rather than live monitoring, and while Tesla said four scheduled (not surprise) audits found no child labor in 2023, an expert said this did not address the risk that cobalt from an estimated 40,000 children working in unregulated artisanal mines gets mixed into the supply chain before reaching Tesla's suppliers.

Tesla Inc. Form 8-K (annual meeting voting results), SEC EDGAR

Asked Nike to publish a report on worker-driven social responsibility and explain why it has not joined binding worker-safety agreements like the Pakistan Accord (which competitors Adidas and Puma have signed), and raised concerns about forced labor and roughly $2.2 million in allegedly unpaid wages owed to about 4,000 garment workers in Cambodia and Thailand.

With a coalition of over 60 investors

Result: Per Yahoo Finance/Reuters reporting on the following year's repeat vote, the 2023 version of this proposal 'was rejected by nearly 80%' of votes cast; the proposal did not pass. A repeat proposal was voted down again in 2024; we could not confirm the exact 2024 percentage from the sources retrieved.

We found no documented change in Nike's supply-chain labor agreements or practices as a result of this campaign.

Nike shareholders vote against proposal on workers' rights, Reuters (via Yahoo Finance)

Asked TJX to adopt and publicly disclose a policy letting all employees, part-time and full-time, accrue paid sick leave usable after a reasonable probationary period, with no expiration date or pandemic-only condition.

Result: 22.29% of votes were in favor at the June 6, 2023 annual meeting; the proposal did not pass.

We found no documented change to TJX's sick leave policy following this vote.

Paid sick leave at TJX COMPANIES, INC., PRI Collaboration Platform

Asked the company to address housekeeping starting wages cited at $12.00/hour against a benchmark $20.40/hour living wage, alongside racial-representation gaps in leadership and a large CEO-to-median-worker pay ratio (cited at 346 to 1).

Result: Vote percentage not confirmed in the sources retrieved for this research. Filed under SEC Rule 14a-8.

we found no documented change confirmed in the sources retrieved.

Cost Externalization: A Bad Trade for Diversified Shareholders, Proxy Preview

Asked the company to address a starting wage described as more than 32% below a 2019 calculation of a living wage, on the argument that poverty wages impose costs (public-assistance reliance, turnover, lower consumer spending) that diversified shareholders ultimately bear.

Result: Vote percentage not confirmed in the sources retrieved for this research. Filed under SEC Rule 14a-8.

we found no documented change confirmed in the sources retrieved.

Cost Externalization: A Bad Trade for Diversified Shareholders, Proxy Preview

Asked Amazon to disclose its workforce turnover rates as an indicator of job quality.

Result: Amazon reported that shareholders voted against every proposal on the ballot at its May 25, 2022 annual meeting. The sources reviewed did not include the exact vote percentage for this specific proposal.

We found no documented turnover-rate disclosure published by Amazon that sources attribute to this proposal.

The 2022 Amazon Proposals, ICCR

Asked the board to publish an analysis of what it would take to raise tipped workers' starting pay to the full state or federal minimum wage, with tips on top, rather than relying on the lower tipped minimum wage (the 'tip credit').

With Benedictine Sisters of Mount St. Scholastica

Result: 12.4% of votes cast were in favor, on a for-and-against basis excluding both broker non-votes and abstentions, at the May 12, 2022 annual meeting; the proposal did not pass. The SEC Form 8-K reports 1,697,217 votes for, 11,951,398 against, 216,418 abstentions and 1,477,256 broker non-votes; including abstentions in the denominator gives 12.2%.

We found no documented change to Dine Brands' tip-credit policy following this vote. Dine Brands' board had opposed the proposal, arguing the tip credit lets servers earn above minimum wage.

Dine Brands Global, Inc. Form 8-K (Item 5.07, voting results), SEC EDGAR

Asked Walmart's board to report on whether the company's starting hourly wages for new associates are consistent with Walmart's own racial-justice commitments.

Result: 13.4% of votes cast were in favor at the June 1, 2022 annual meeting; the proposal did not pass. Filed under SEC Rule 14a-8.

We found no documented change to Walmart's starting-wage policy that any source attributes to this vote. Walmart's CEO cited an average hourly wage above $17 (as of April 2022) in opposing the proposal, not as a result of it.

Walmart Announces 2022 Annual Shareholders' Meeting Voting Results, Business Wire

The proposal asked Activision Blizzard to publish an annual public report on the effectiveness of its efforts to reduce workplace discrimination, harassment, and abuse, including settlement figures and pending case data.

Result: Approved by shareholders at the June 2022 annual meeting despite the board's recommendation to vote against it; proxy advisors ISS and Glass Lewis both endorsed the proposal.

Activision Blizzard published a transparency report in 2023 disclosing 114 harassment, discrimination, or retaliation reports received in 2022, of which 29 were substantiated, along with more than 36 corrective actions taken.

Activision Blizzard shareholders approve proposal for report on abuse and harassment, CNBC

Asked Amazon's board to commission an independent third-party audit of how productivity quotas and surveillance practices affect injury and turnover rates among warehouse workers.

With three unnamed co-filers, per source

Result: Amazon petitioned the SEC to exclude the proposal, arguing it involved ordinary business operations. The sources reviewed did not confirm the SEC's ruling or a final vote result.

We found no documented change to Amazon's productivity-quota or warehouse surveillance practices attributed to this proposal in the sources reviewed.

Investors, regulators, Congress focus on companies' treatment of workers, Roll Call

Asked each retailer to make the paid sick leave benefit it had offered during the pandemic a permanent policy for all employees.

Result: CVS Health asked the SEC for permission to leave the proposal off its ballot. The sources reviewed did not confirm that Target, Kroger, or TJX took similar action.

We found no documented company in this group that adopted a permanent paid sick leave policy specifically attributed to this campaign in the sources reviewed.

Activist investors push retailers to strengthen sick leave policies, Axios

Asked Amazon's board to establish paid sick leave for all employees, arguing the company could afford it.

Result: Amazon reported that shareholders voted against every resolution on the ballot at its May 25, 2022 annual meeting. The sources reviewed did not include the exact vote percentage for this specific proposal.

We found no documented company-wide paid sick leave policy adopted by Amazon that any source attributes to this proposal.

The 2022 Amazon Proposals, ICCR

Asked Amazon's board for an independent examination of the company's policies, practices and products on civil rights, equity, diversity and inclusion, including pay and advancement and the disparate racial impacts on hourly warehouse workers, and how those affect the business.

Result: Sources give slightly different figures for the same vote. The Comptroller's office reports 44.18% support, which it described as a record level of support for an environmental or social shareholder proposal at Amazon at that time. ICCR reports 44% of total shares voted and 55% of independent shareholders' shares in favor. The proposal was refiled for the 2022 proxy season and then withdrawn before that vote.

Amazon agreed to commission an independent racial equity audit led by former Attorney General Loretta Lynch. We found no documented publication of the completed audit's findings and no other resulting policy change that sources attribute to this vote.

Shareholders' ESG Proposals Make Significant Gains at Amazon, ICCR

Asked Tyson's board to prepare a report on human rights due diligence, covering whether the company was doing enough on paid sick leave, COVID-19 testing and case counts, workload, and meaningful engagement with workers after over 12,500 workers were infected and dozens died during the pandemic.

With 22 co-filing institutional and faith-based investors

Result: Sources disagree on the exact figure. Investor Advocates for Social Justice reported the proposal won 78.7% support among independent (non-Tyson-family) shares but only 18.4% of total votes cast, because the Tyson family's Class B supervoting shares give it majority voting control regardless of other shareholders. PR Newswire separately reported 'nearly 82 percent' support among independent shareholders for a package of proposals that included this one plus a lobbying-disclosure resolution.

Investor Advocates for Social Justice reported that Tyson 'largely failed to engage meaningfully,' did not address the concerns raised, withheld preliminary vote results at the meeting, and gave no opportunity for questions; the annual meeting lasted less than 30 minutes. We found no documented policy change at Tyson attributable to this vote.

Tyson Dismisses Shareholders' Human Rights Concerns at Annual Meeting, Investor Advocates for Social Justice

Asked each company's board to report on the feasibility of making paid sick leave a standard employee benefit beyond the COVID-19 pandemic.

With As You Sow, CtW Investment Group, ICCR members

Result: Filed in December 2020 for the 2021 proxy season at seven companies. The sources reviewed did not confirm individual vote outcomes.

We found no documented company in this group that adopted permanent paid sick leave specifically attributed to this campaign in the sources reviewed.

As Covid Spikes, Investors Press for Paid Sick Leave for Frontline Retail and Food Workers, ICCR

A coalition of over 120 organizations demanded Tyson Foods provide personal protective equipment, paid sick leave, slower slaughter-line speeds, comprehensive COVID-19 testing, physical distancing, protection from retaliation for workers who organize, and elimination of a punitive attendance point system, after over 8,500 workers across 37 facilities tested positive for COVID-19 and more than 25 died.

With Friends of the Earth, HEAL Food Alliance, The Humane League, Venceremos, 120+ other organizations

Result: This was a public pressure campaign and sign-on letter directed partly at Tyson's institutional investors, not a shareholder resolution put to a vote.

We found no documented company-wide policy change directly attributed to this July 2020 campaign; continued investor dissatisfaction with Tyson's response is documented in the February 2021 shareholder vote listed separately above.

120+ organizations target meatpacking giant Tyson Foods for failing to protect workers from Covid-19, Friends of the Earth

Pressed Citigroup, through a shareholder resolution and direct engagement, to disclose its median (unadjusted, company-wide) gender and racial pay gap rather than only a narrower 'equal pay for equal work' adjusted figure.

Result: On January 16, 2019, Citigroup became the first major U.S. bank to disclose median pay gap data: women earned 29% less than men and minorities earned 7% less than non-minority employees on an unadjusted, company-wide basis.

Citigroup committed to increasing female representation in mid-to-senior roles to 40% by 2021. Separately, per HR Dive, JPMorgan Chase, Bank of America, Mastercard, Wells Fargo and Bank of New York Mellon each agreed to work on closing pay gaps for women and non-white employees following similar shareholder pressure from Arjuna Capital, though the sources retrieved do not give those banks' specific disclosure figures.

Citigroup reveals it pays women 29 percent less than men in unprecedented disclosure, CBS News

Mondelez had already decided to move about 600 Nabisco factory jobs from Chicago's South Side to Salinas, Mexico. At the company's May 2017 annual meeting, the AFL-CIO's shareholder proposal asked the board to set up a joint labor-management committee to look at alternatives to plant closings in the future.

Result: Vote percentage not found in the sources retrieved for this research; the proposal was raised and voted on at the May 17, 2017 annual meeting. Filed under SEC Rule 14a-8.

we found no documented change: the relocation to Salinas, Mexico proceeded as planned; no source retrieved shows Mondelez reversing the move or adopting the requested labor-management committee.

Offshoring of Oreo-Maker Jobs Dominates Mondelez Shareholder Meeting, AFL-CIO