Daily CSR
Daily CSR

Daily CSR
Daily news about corporate social responsibility, ethics and sustainability

‘Business Can Do More To Help The Average American’



10/05/2019

Business Roundtable organisation announces revised purpose statement.


Dailycsr.com – 05 October 2019 – The Chief Executive Officers from the “largest companies in the U.S.A.” came together to form the “Business Roundtable” organisation. The companies that fit in this category have a combined revenue of “US$7 trillion”, annual R&D investment of “147 billion”, employee list of “15 million people” and offer “healthcare and retirements benefits” to “tens of millions of Americans”.
 
All the member companies have their operation across the fifty states as they work with “top business leaders” to “influence major societal issues” such as the need of infrastructure, tax policy, trade matters and so on. In fact, many “institutional and retail investors” place bet here for the economic future. Much of the capital needed for managing the “round for the BRT companies” come from the investors, while the BRT member companies’ investors get nearly “$300 billion in dividends”.
 
Thus, investors have taken a priority seat for the member C.E.O.s for the past five decades. The “statement of the purpose of the corporation” from Business Roundtable that was issues in 1997, read:
“The paramount duty of management and of boards of directors is to the corporation’s stockholders.”
 
However, things have changed from August 2019, as the Business Roundtable treads beyond the long-term operating principle of “shareholder primacy” and releases a revised “Statement on the Purpose of a Corporation” whereby marking a dramatic change in its operating philosophy.
 
Nearly two hundred chief executive signatories have pledged for investing in employees, delivering values to their customers, dealing with suppliers in fair and ethical manner, supporting communities of their operation besides generating “long-term value for shareholders”.
 
The purpose Statement held every stakeholders as an essential part with the commitment of delivering value to “all of them”. The chief executive officer of JPMorgan Chase, who currently heads the BRT, had an important role to play “in the dramatic shift of attitude in the official stance of the organization”. To him this move is “an acknowledgement that business can do more to help the average American.”
 
While, the IBM’s C.E.O, Ginni Rometty added:
“Society gives each of us a license to operate. It’s a question of whether society trusts you or not”.
 
The organisation’s website states: “as leaders of America’s largest corporations, BRT CEOs believe we have a responsibility to help build a strong and sustainable economic future in the United States.”
 
In fact, the G&A Institute’s newsletter further informs:
“ESG and Sustainability basic principles are now “officially recognized” by the members of the CEO association and enshrined in the declaration of the purpose of the U.S. large corporation”.
 
 
 
References:
3blmedia.com