Executive compensation – Seventh Generation Interfaith Coalition for Responsible Investing

SEC Finalizes Pay Versus Performance Disclosure Rules

September 2, 2022November 16, 2022Chris Cox

Last Friday (August 25), the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) adopted final rules implementing the “pay versus performance” disclosure requirement, completing a 12-year journey to fulfill a provision of the 2010 Dodd-Frank Act.

Under the rule, U.S. public companies must provide a new table in their annual proxy filings that contains executive compensation and financial performance measures covering a period of up to five years. While this new rule does not mandate any action that will narrow the pay disparity between executives and workers or reduce wealth inequality in the U.S., the rule requires companies to provide data comparing executive pay to financial performance. This table and the new figures will provide investors some clearer information for the mandatory (advisory) “Say on Pay” votes in every company’s proxy.

As a result, I hope that this makes Rosanna Landis Weaver’s work for As You Sow a little easier as she annually prepares a report on “The 100 Most Overpaid CEOs.” Previously, she had to dig through the not-so-transparent data in the “Compensation Discussion and Analysis” (CD&A), a required part of a company’s annual proxy statement, to generate her figures. Theoretically, the new rule will allow for a more straightforward means of comparison. (Worth noting: Year after year, the report uncovers overpaid CEOs who underperform on “Total Shareholder Return.”)

As You Sow, The 100 Most Overpaid CEOs, 2022

Some will take issue with the new disclosure rule as it is all about financial performance. Rightfully, socially responsible investors may be concerned because these new required charts do not include non-financial disclosure (i.e., human rights performance or emissions reduction). However, the rule does not preclude a company from including that information.

The new rule may draw companies to better tell their story, rather than bury shareholders in legalese. At the end of the day, the rule is not just about filling out the table, but that companies devote time to develop a narrative that helps investors understand how pay and performance align.

Even after this rulemaking, the SEC has yet to finish the implementation of Dodd-Frank. Perhaps we may see the SEC finalize the long-delayed provision for a clawback rule for accounting missteps mandated by Dodd-Frank. And we may be light years from reducing pay disparity and acting on wealth inequality, but better disclosure is a small step in the right direction.

Time for a Say-on-Pay

February 22, 2022May 23, 2022Chris Cox

The proxy statements for 2022 are arriving, and we debate anew: “How much is too much?”

Mandated under the Dodd-Frank Act, say-on-pay is a nonbinding, advisory shareholder vote on the compensation policies for the company’s executive officers. In their proxy statement, companies must disclose how their compensation strategy has considered the results of their most recent say-on-pay vote, but the law does not require the company to make any changes based on the vote. Nonetheless, the say-on pay vote is a barometer for shareholder perception of the company’s executive compensation practices.

For instance, Apple proposes a $99 million pay package for CEO Tim Cook this year, but shareholder advisory firm ISS has recommended a “no” vote. I understand the basis for ISS’ recommendation is because it is triple the package of peer median pay and serves no purpose for retaining Cook, as he will earn shares in retirement. On the contrary, Glass Lewis, the other large proxy advisor, recommended supporting the package.

It is almost certain that the Apple say-on-pay resolution will have a majority of support as most shareholders routinely vote in favor of these packages. This will have a cascading effect on executive compensation in 2023 as peer companies will try to keep up. Cook’s proposed salary may simply be keeping up with the Joneses as Alphabet’s CEO Sundar Pichai was awarded more than $280 million in 2019.

Last year, however, bore seeds of hopeful news. Failure rates on compensation packages in 2021 were considerably higher than 2020 and 2019 levels as numerous companies experienced a “failed” vote for the first time, including AT&T, Marathon, Starbucks, and Walgreens. A more complete list of failed say-on-pay votes can be found here.

There are, of course, better ways to ask the question than “How much is too much?” We hosted a webinar last year on Pay and Wealth Disparity. One of the participants, Rosanna Landis Weaver, will host her annual webinar on Thursday: “100 Most Overpaid CEOs: Are Fund Managers Asleep at the Wheel?” (You can register here.) As well, one can turn to the AFL-CIO’s Executive Paywatch.

SGI has a long history in this space. From our founding in 1973, Fr. Mike Crosby, O.F.M., Cap. advocated for a living wage. SGI consistently advocates for increasing the federal minimum wage.

In 2013, President Obama said, “Rising income inequality is the defining challenge of our time.” Pope Francis, in the same year, noted, “How can it be that it is not a news item when an elderly homeless person dies of exposure, but it is news when the stock market loses two points?” As a consequence, one of Fr. Mike’s final efforts was a campaign for pay equity in 2014, filing shareholder resolutions with 12 retailers. The SEC allowed companies to omit the resolution based on ‘micro management.’ SGI members continue to challenge retailers and restaurants to pay living wages, for their own workers and for those in their supply chain.

In hopes of building an economy that works for the many, not one that concentrates more and more wealth in the hands of a privileged few, we keep coming back to this issue to see if there are new ways that we can address income and wealth disparity. The Franciscan Sisters of Perpetual Adoration proposal in 2021 on racial equity & starting pay at the Walmart AGM obtained strong shareholder support for a first-time resolution (12.5% of total shares or 27% of independent shares voted). SGI members have joined this year’s ICCR campaign asking restaurants to raise their sub-minimum wage for tipped workers.

Increasingly, economists have come to see that wealth and income disparity harm the economy. Rising concern for pay and wealth disparity in proxy voting and changes at the SEC lead us to think the tide may be shifting, and so we call upon shareholders to act.

Pay and Wealth Disparity: Still our greatest social challenge

June 4, 2021Chris Cox

By Frank Sherman

Sister Sue Ernster’s (Franciscan Sisters of Perpetual Adoration) proposal on racial equity & starting pay at the Walmart AGM earlier this week obtained strong shareholder support for a first-time resolution (12.5% of total shares or 27% of independent shares voted). Congratulations to Sue and the many ICCR co-filers.

I’m reminded of Father Mike Crosby’s 2015 campaign on income disparity. At that time, President Obama called the growing pay & wealth gap in our country “the greatest social challenge of our time“…. and it hasn’t gotten better since then. We didn’t get very far back then after the SEC’s sided with the companies, permitting them to omit our proposal from the proxy based on the “ordinary business” exclusion.

Starting in 2011, the Dodd–Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act of 2010 required companies to include disclosure of the total compensation of the top 5 paid executives in their annual proxy statements. Shareholders are allowed to cast a non-binding advisory vote for or against these pay packages (“say-on-pay”). Very few companies “failed” their say-on-pay vote in recent years. A failure occurs if the company does not obtain majority support from shareholders for the executive compensation proposal.

The tide may be shifting. Twice as many say-on-pay proposals failed this year as in previous years, including some companies that had never had a failure in these resolutions. As You Sow’s Rosanna Landis Weaver does great work digging through the fine print of the “Compensation Discussion and Analysis” section of each company’s proxy statement with an annual report on the 100 Most Overpaid CEOs. A recent NEI article on CEO compensation (A Promising Start To The Challenge Of Excessive CEO Pay) notes that support for pay packages among S&P 500 firms fell to an average of 87%, down 3 percentage points from 2020 and 2019, and down 4 points from 2016 to 2018. It references a report from the Institute for Policy Studies (Pandemic Pay Plunder: Low-Wage Workers Lost Hours, Jobs, and Lives. Their Employers Bent the Rules – to Pump up CEO Paychecks) which found that 51 of the S&P 500 firms with the lowest median worker wage revised their pay rules in 2020, so that median worker pay fell 2%, while CEO pay rose—by 29%.

Investors pushed corporations to tie their pay packages to stock performance (…to better align management pay with investor returns) in the early ’90s. Little did they know that this would be used by companies to successively ratchet up CEO, and as a result, the rest of management’s, comp packages every year to a level that makes U.S. CEOs stand out on the global stage.

The Dodd–Frank Act also required companies to disclose the ratio of CEO compensation to the median compensation of their employees. The rule has only been in effect since 2017, but the SEC allows companies “substantial flexibility” in the calculation of the ratio, making it difficult for investors and society to make meaningful comparisons.

Of course, CEO’s know that their pay relative to the median pay of their workers is out of control. But even if they wanted to change this (and I’m not sure many “want” to do so), they are reluctant to be a first mover on restructuring pay because it would “negatively impact retention and make them less competitive”.

As we complete the next draft of SGI’s strategic plan and think about our engagement focus for the 2022 season (which starts this summer), I believe pay disparity has to be high on our list. I hope you concur.

Overpaid CEOs

February 26, 2019Chris Cox

On Thursday, our friends at As You Sow released their fifth annual report on the 100 Most Overpaid CEOs. The launch included a webinar with Rosanna Landis Weaver (the report’s author), Paul Herman (founder and CEO of HIP Investor), and ex-Secretary of Labor Robert Reich.

Not only are these 100 CEOs overpaid concerning the poor performance of their companies, many fund managers, like BlackRock, Vanguard and StateStreet, routinely endorse the executive compensation package of these CEOs at the annual shareholder meeting. The report points to necessary actions by shareholders concerning executive compensation. It really is worth your time to dive in.

Axios.com offered succinct coverage of the webinar and report here.

The report can be found here. The webinar can be found here.

Shareholders work for racial justice

March 15, 2018July 17, 2018Chris Cox

In order to prepare a truly human future, it is not enough to reject evil. We must build the common good together.

— Pope Francis (@Pontifex) March 15, 2018

Four SGI members participated in ICCR‘s Spring Conference: Sr. Ruth Battaglia, C.S.A., Chris Cox, Frank Sherman, and Friar Robert Wotypka, O.F.M., Cap. We will report back what we heard and learned in a variety of ways in the coming weeks.

Today’s tweet from Pope Francis reminds us that preventing evil is not enough; we must take positive action together. Since its inception, SGI has endeavored to make the voices and concerns of those who suffer injustice the center of our reflection and action. I see it reflected as well in the work of the new Racial Justice Investing group within ICCR.

National events in 2017 intensified focus on racial, ethnic, and gender equality. The #MeToo movement, protests concerning the Confederate Flag and Confederate statues, the Women’s March, and the Black Lives Matter movement all contributed to this shift in focus. While personal conversion is vital to change, it is not enough. Addressing systemic injustice requires changes in structures at the level of policy, economics, and worldviews.

A session at the recent ICCR conference included a session from the newly formed Racial Justice Investing group. Pat Tomaino of Zevin Asset Management chaired the session. We also heard from Lisa Hayles of Boston Common Asset Management, Susan Baker of Trillium Asset Management, and Mari Schwartzer of NorthStar Asset Management. Hayles spoke of The 30% Coalition (that corporate boardrooms reflect the gender, racial and ethnic diversity of the United States workforce). Susan Baker discussed workforce diversity and the case for pressing companies to make the composition of the workforce transparent. Schwartzer voiced concerns about prison labor (NPR reported on some of the issues). Finally, Tomaino addressed diversity and inclusion, especially within the tech workforce.

The Racial Justice Investing group has monthly/semi-monthly calls and has a webpage within ICCR’s member area where SGI members can sign up to participate and to receive regular updates. Previously, the group drafted a Mission Statement:

Racial Justice Investing is a group of socially responsible investors and others in the business community who are taking action for racial justice within our own organizations, as well as in our engagements with portfolio companies.

This important work will contribute to our corporate engagements. We heard about success from Johns Hopkins in hiring of ex-offenders. We talked about resolutions asking tech companies to tie portion of executive compensation to diversity and inclusion goals among other sustainability goals. We also heard about work from the American Friends Service Committee investigating corporate investments in the prison industry. Much remains to be done, but it is exciting to see our partners deeply engaging this issue.

Priests of the Sacred Heart continue to challenge TJX’s executive pay policies

May 10, 2017July 21, 2017Chris Cox

The TJX Companies, which includes well-known discount chains of TJ Maxx, Marshalls and Home Goods, is the leading off-price apparel and home fashions retailer in the U.S. …and worldwide. They claim 40 years of sales and earnings growth to the satisfaction of their shareholders. But not all shareholders are happy. “TJX maintains one of the largest pay gaps in America,” said Mark Peters, Director of Justice, Peace and Reconciliation for the Priests of the Sacred Heart. “As public scrutiny of the gap between CEO and worker pay increases, TJX may be risking the health of its labor force and the reputation of its brand.”

Mark filed a shareholder resolution with TJX concerning their executive pay policies and the widening pay gap with their workers for the third year in a row (see proxy memo). “The company’s proxy states that developing and retaining talent is a key component of their continued success. But this attention should not be limited to their executives. Their Associates’ pay has stagnated while executive compensation packages continue to escalate. Long term, this hurts the company and society.”

CEO pay has grew by almost 1000% over the past 40 years, greatly outpacing the growth in the cost of living, the productivity of the economy, and the stock market. This disproves the claim that the growth in CEO pay reflects the performance of the company, the value of its stock, or the ability of the CEO to do anything but disproportionately raise the amount of his pay (Economic Policy Institute).

Beginning in 2018, a Dodd-Frank Act provision requires companies to report the ratio of the CEO’s total compensation and that of their median employee. While the Trump administration is reviewing this requirement as too burdensome, Mark believes that it is not enough. “Shareholders need a historic view of this ratio and board’s informed view on whether the CEO-to-worker pay gap comes at the expense of the health of the Company’s human capital and long term shareholder value.”

Investors with $3 Trillion in Assets Call for CEO-to-Worker Pay Ratio Disclosure

March 22, 2017April 17, 2017Steve Herro

Seventh Generation Interfaith members Congregation of St. Agnes, Franciscan Sisters of Perpetual Adoration, Dana Investment Advisers, Province of St. Joseph of the Capuchin Order, Racine Dominican Sisters, Priests of the Sacred Heart (U.S. Province), School Sisters of St. Francis, and Sisters of the Presentation of the Blessed Virgin Mary, joined over 100 institutional investors in a letter to the SEC in support of maintaining existing CEO-to-worker pay ratio disclosure requirements.