According to a recent national survey of 1,000 respondents aged 18 and older conducted by Allianz Life Insurance Company of North America, investors care fairly equally about each of environmental, social, and governance issues when making an investing decision, but the company's position on social issues outweighs its corporate governance posture and its record on environmental issues when it comes to whether individuals decide to do business with the company.
Notably, there is a huge gap between what respondents said is important in their investment decision-making vs. how those factors have actually impacted their investment decisions:
- 84% said that providing safe working conditions for employees is important in their decision to invest compared to 42% who said they chose to invest/not invest based on that issue.
- 81% said that transparency in the company's business practices and finances is important in their decision to invest vs. 44% who said they chose to invest/not invest based on that issue.
- 80% said that providing living wages to employees is important in their decision to invest compared to 40% who said they chose to invest/not invest based on that issue.
- 78% said that providing quality health insurance to their employees is important in their decision to invest vs. 42% who said they chose to invest/not invest based on that issue.
- 76% said natural resource conservation is important in their decision to invest compared to 44% who said they chose to invest/not invest based on that issue.
More than 30% of respondents said they intentionally chose not to invest in a company because of the company's business practices relating to animal testing and political candidate donations/PACs, and more than 20% chose not to do so because of companies' business practices on LGBTQ+ equality, racial equality, or executive compensation levels.
See also this ThinkAdvisor post, this Corporate Secretary article, and numerous additional resources on our ESG page.This post first appeared in the weekly Society Alert!