Shareholder Voices Poised to Grow Louder With SEC’s Help
A Walt Disney Co. shareholder wants the board to study the company’s workplace training, arguing it could discriminate against white employees. A shareholder in Apple Inc. is asking for a public report on the corporation’s use of mandatory arbitration and other legal tools in dealing with sexual-harassment claims.
In the past, such shareholder proposals could have been easily swept aside, never making it to a vote at a company’s annual meeting. But the Securities and Exchange Commission in November overturned several mechanisms that companies routinely use to shoot down shareholder proposals, and specified that shareholders were allowed to press companies on issues of broad social importance.
Photo credit: BEN MARGOT/ASSOCIATED PRESS
