According to its 3rd Quarter Shareholder Engagement report, sustainability investor Arjuna Capital filed 21 shareholder proposals during the 2018 proxy season. The report highlights engagement and proxy voting activities on these topics:
- Pay Equity: Since January, all nine financial companies where Arjuna Capital filed shareholder proposals have disclosed or committed to disclose and address their gender (and often, also their racial) pay gaps. Of the 23 Arjuna has engaged to date on pay equity, 21 companies across the tech, consumer, and financial sectors reportedly have agreed to disclose and close their pay gaps. Arjuna also plans to expand its campaign in the fall to request disclosure on global "median pay" gaps (median pay of all women versus the median pay of all men in a firm's workforce), which allegedly "reflect the structural deficit companies face when so few women hold high paying leadership positions."
- Content Governance: Arjuna filed proposals with major social media companies that target "content governance," i.e., the business and public policy risks associated with fake news, election interference, hate speech, violence, and sexual harassment, propagated over their platforms that allegedly violate the companies' own terms of service. These proposals reportedly garnered average support from over 1/3 of independent shareholders.
- Climate Change: Arjuna engaged, and in partnership with As You Sow, filed shareholder proposals, with major energy companies on climate change issues ranging from methane leakage and distributed energy to carbon asset risk and low carbon business planning - attaining agreements from some companies on enhanced reporting.