Last week, we explored how internship programs can deliver real business value when done right. This week, I’m putting our money where our mouth is by sharing findings from one of our own summer intern projects: an analysis by Sofia Maria Giorgianni that reveals crucial insights about how America’s most just companies are approaching AI workforce development.
Sofia’s research couldn’t be more timely. Our polling shows that AI is a critical issue to the American public with 70% of respondents agreeing that CEOs have a key role to play in the ethical use of AI, and Americans consistently rank worker advancement and training as a top issue. As AI reshapes the private sector, a critical question emerges: How are companies investing in their workers to ensure they can thrive in an AI-powered future? The answer, according to our data, is encouraging.
Among the 2025 Just 100, 84% of companies mention AI in their disclosures, yet only 20% specifically disclose AI talent development initiatives. This represents both a challenge and an opportunity. The companies leading the way – including Salesforce, Constellation Energy, Boston Scientific, Visa, and The Hershey Company – span 13 different industries, showing that AI readiness isn’t just a tech sector concern.
Interestingly, companies with AI training initiatives tend to rank higher overall in our Rankings of America’s Most Just Companies while those without such programs skew toward the bottom. This suggests a link between future-readiness and just business behavior. Companies that invest in their workers’ AI capabilities are often the same ones excelling across other stakeholder dimensions.
Sofia’s work demonstrates how fresh perspectives can illuminate critical business challenges. Her proposed AI talent development metric will help us track – and encourage – this emerging dimension of corporate performance going forward.
Be well,
Martin
Fortune looks at how AI is already flattening organizational structures, removing managers and distance between staff and the C-suite.
The New York Times reveals 21 ways people are using AI to cut down their workloads.
AI startup Perplexity makes a $34.5 billion dollar bid for Google Chrome’s browser. Bloomberg has the story.
Pew Research Center finds Americans remain split on whether companies should issue public statements on political or social issues — roughly half view them as important, but opinions vary significantly by race and political affiliation.
The Wall Street Journal digs into the data that shows the era of big pay raises for low-wage workers is over.
The Washington Post reports that Nvidia and AMD have agreed to remit 15% of their revenue from AI chip sales in China to the U.S. government as part of an unusual arrangement tied to export licenses, sparking warnings about potential constitutional conflicts.
Axios outlines the mounting pressures on consulting firms as both AI efficiency gains and government contract cuts disrupt the traditional billable hours model.
Fortune reveals that despite CEOs across the country instituting RTO mandates, only 7% of them regularly appear in their own offices.
The New York Times explains that Big Tech’s net-zero proclamations are on shaky ground due to the massive spike in energy usage from their AI investments.
Axios examines how companies have used economic downturns to replace workers with automation and how another recession would likely accelerate businesses replacing workers with AI.
According to Morningstar, U.S. ESG funds experienced net outflows in both 2023 and 2024, reversing a decade of growth as traditional sustainability strategies face mounting skepticism. The latest data from GS Sustain also points to 23 consecutive months of outflows for North American sustainable equity funds. Amid this retreat, I’m excited to share that JUST Capital’s stakeholder-focused approach is demonstrating remarkable resilience as of June 30, 2025.
Since inception in December 2016 the JUST U.S. Large Cap Diversified Index (JULCD) has delivered cumulative returns of 231.9%, outperforming the Russell 1000 Cap-Weighted Index by 11.4 percentage points. Meanwhile, our JUST 100 Index has generated an impressive 49.7 percentage points of alpha over its benchmark, with returns of 125.7% versus 76.1% for the Russell 1000 Equally Weighted Index since March 2019.
We also see persistent outperformance at the company level. Those in the top decile of JUST overall scores have outperformed their counterparts in the bottom-decile by a remarkable 90.2 percentage points since January 2018. Notably, companies that prioritize worker investments – providing fair wages, comprehensive benefits, strong health and safety protections, robust training and advancement opportunities, and fostering inclusive workplaces – see the biggest dividends. Top-decile performers in our Worker stakeholder have generated a spread of 129.7 percentage points over their bottom-decile peers since January 2018.
Investors are noticing the opportunity. While traditional ESG investing has declined, the JUST ETF attracted net inflows in both 2024 and year-to-date 2025.
All of this is supported by our proprietary research, which points to an “efficient frontier” of stakeholder performance that varies by industry, by financial measurement, and by the underlying stakeholder issue in question. If you’d like to learn more, please reach out.
Be well,
Martin
Business Insider reports that several U.S. senators are pushing Delta for more information on their new pricing plan, which aims to use AI to set ticket prices.
Fortune looks at how the overwhelming increase of bots on the internet – accounting for 50% of all internet traffic last year – is poised to become more of a problem as AI proliferates. More inside.
Bill Gates, Steve Balmer, and others are putting $1 billion over the next 15 years into “AI for good” to support people who work in undeserved jobs like parole officers, social workers, and more. The American Bazaar has the story.
The Wall Street Journal looks at the growing number of technology companies aiming to upend food delivery with AI powered robots.
Fortune reveals that researchers from top AI companies are warning that they’re losing the ability to understand how their AI is thinking.
The New York Times examines how the immigration crackdown is straining the caregiving industry, particularly senior centers in the U.S.
GM’s profits shrank by $1.1 billion due to tariff impacts. The Wall Street Journal has the story.
Inc. looks at the pushback Starbucks is receiving from its new RTO mandate – which would ask many of its corporate employees to relocate to Seattle or Toronto within 12 months.
Axios looks at the growing sentiment gap between rich and poor Americans and finds the divide growing wider than it has in many years. Explore the findings here.
The devastating floods that swept through Central Texas over the Fourth of July weekend have once again demonstrated a fundamental truth about companies in America: in times of heartbreak and crisis, the just ones show up.
Even as search and rescue operations continue in Kerr County and surrounding areas, we’re witnessing meaningful displays of corporate humanity at work. Several of America’s largest companies have jumped in – from Airbnb.org to Lowe’s to AT&T – as they did following the wildfires in Los Angeles earlier this year and in the aftermath of Hurricane Helene in North Carolina last year.
One Texas-based company stands out from the pack. H-E-B grocery chain has proven that their motto “No Store Does More” is more than just a marketing tagline. With roots in Kerrville – the epicenter of the current flooding – H-E-B’s response has been both immediate and significant. And it isn’t an anomaly – it’s an extension of their everyday commitment to Texas communities. The company:
When one Facebook user posted a video of H-E-B disaster relief vehicles heading toward flood zones, the comment “This is exactly why Texans love HEB!” captured a sentiment that runs deep.
The floods in central Texas are a tragedy that will require sustained support from multiple sources. But they’ve also shown that in a divided time, American businesses can help us come together.
Be well,
Martin
The Wall Street Journal features some of the upstarts looking to profit from Google Search’s demise, as people stop clicking on links and ads and switch to reading AI summaries.
According to Fortune, students and professors are both using AI at higher rates, either to complete assignments or create lesson plans.
Meanwhile, the Atlantic asks the important question: “What should young people study when AI threatens to take their jobs?”
The New York Times highlights the debate over which group of workers will be most affected by AI layoffs: new workers, or the experienced?
Yahoo Finance runs down which states have new minimum wage laws going into effect this week.
Fortune reveals that 75% of employers now use personality and skill tests in addition to traditional job application materials to cut down on hiring time.
NPR breaks down how the “no taxes on tips” rule in Trump’s spending bill will work for employees.
Axios looks at how middle managers are now overseeing more people on average and how cost-cutting and AI investments are hastening this trend.
Axios and Harris Poll’s 2025 reputation rankings landed this week, concluding that prices – not politics – are now driving corporate reputations.
This finding resonates with our own research. In 2024, we saw significant amounts of alignment across demographics. For the first time in our polling history, we saw fair pricing – which respondents describe as “pricing in line with … value and quality” and companies avoiding “price gouging or excessive price increases” – emerge as a significant bipartisan issue. Interestingly, of the 2025 JUST 100 companies included in the Axios/Harris Poll rankings, the coverage is even; nine are classified as non-partisan, three lean “blue” and two lean “red”.
Given today’s cost of living, this should not be surprising, and companies are already responding to the call. Home Depot recently announced they are not planning to raise prices due to tariffs, but shared that some products may no longer be available as a result. During recent egg shortages, Trader Joe’s – the top company on Axios and Harris Poll’s list – was able to keep prices low by working directly with suppliers and focusing on product selection.
Serving customers through greater transparency and fairness is also very much in line with financial performance. Updating our figure from last week – as of May 27, 2025 our Customer Index has outperformed the Russell 1000 Equal Weighted benchmark by 4% since inception in December 2021.
When companies master the basics of treating people fairly, offering good value products and serving all stakeholders, Americans are ready to reward them, regardless of politics.
Be well,
Martin
“Don’t waste a good crisis. My most favorite leadership roles are ones that I’ve been leading through transformational change and market volatility.”
Mashable reports that the congressional budget bill has a special provision that would ban states from regulating AI for the next decade.
Fortune discusses the claim from a current LinkedIn exec that AI is already starting to “break the first rung” on young peoples’ career ladder, with many companies automating much of the work that new graduates did to break into tech, law, and other professions.
Meanwhile, the New York Post highlights how much of Gen-Z is pivoting to trade work amid AI uncertainty and the extreme rising cost of college.
Axios sits down with Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei who says we’re not taking the job loss implications seriously enough, and there is a possibility that AI wipes out “half of all entry level jobs.”
Debates continue over two versions of a “no taxes on tips” bill up for votes in Congress. The Washington Post shares concerns that this change would encourage restaurants to keep base wages artificially low. Vox concurs, saying that “tipped workers need a raise, not a tax break.”
When it comes to overtime, legal firm Jackson Lewis sees the potential for employers to “restructure compensation to provide employees more take-home pay without incurring higher payroll costs by reducing pay for non-overtime hours and permitting more overtime work that is tax-free — a win for employers and employees.”
Fox News released an op-ed stating that no taxes on overtime is actually the far more important bill with a greater impact for working people, despite receiving less press.
Pew’s latest polling shows support for stricter environmental regulations outweighs opposition in a majority of states.
As layoffs across tech continue, Meta announces plans to rate more employees “below expectations” to make culling easier.
Despite rolling back many Covid-era perks for their employees, The Financial Times seems to think that Covid-era benefits bestowed on C-suites are here to stay.
Axios reveals new data that shows that 77% of Americans think companies are moving too quickly on AI, and would prefer delaying breakthroughs to avoid potential catastrophic mistakes.
“One lesson of the backlash [to ESG] is that executives must anchor their actions more firmly in a business case”. So wrote Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson in this week’s edition of the always-insightful Semafor CEO Signal newsletter. He’s 100% right. I have been talking to CEOs, executives, and corporate board members over the last few weeks about how they see stakeholder matters in the current climate and this is a universal position.
On environmental issues, the case for leadership is compelling, especially as the potential for reshoring accelerates. Our polling shows the public supports the creation of more jobs in the U.S. At the same time, Americans across the political spectrum value clean air, water and soil. A majority is worried about the impacts of a changing climate. As one of our focus group participants (Republican, male) put it, “If [companies] post record profits, but pollute a river or lake, those profits come from the public.” The very definition of an economic externality, in other words.
Safeguarding the health of our natural environment becomes particularly critical for businesses seeking to reshore manufacturing activities. Hershey’s commitment to reduce water usage by 20% at priority sites in water-scarce regions will reduce the company’s operating expenses and support the future sustainability of its domestic manufacturing capacity (which was already at 70% prior to a $1 billion announcement to boost its supply chain in Pennsylvania through 2026). The recent announcement by Microsoft (#1 on Environment in our 2025 Rankings) of a $3.3 billion investment in Wisconsin for cloud computing and AI-infrastructure will require the company to surpass its already industry-leading efforts on water conservation and energy efficiency if it’s to meet its target of becoming carbon-negative, water-positive, and zero waste by 2030.
Other companies leading in Just Capital’s assessment of environmental performance
include Aptiv (Automobiles & Parts), Graphic Packaging Holding Co. (Industrial Goods), Hewlett Packard Enterprise (Computer Services) and Johnson & Johnson (Pharma). To Edgecliffe-Johnson’s point, the business case here is clear. As of April 14, 2025 Environment Leaders have outperformed the Russell 1000 Equal Weighted Index by 5.6% since inception (December 31, 2021). As domestic manufacturing grows, so the opportunity for real innovation in protecting domestic natural capital also grows.
Be well,
Martin
“And what I said…we’ve been in business for over a century. Political winds blow in all different directions, particularly when you operate in almost 150 countries. But there are fundamental truths that have guided this company for 98 years: We welcome all to our hotels, and we create opportunity for all at our company…the next day I got 40,000 emails from Marriott associates around the world just saying, ‘thank you’.”
– Marriott CEO Anthony Capuano speaking to Fortune about the statement he made on Trump’s sweeping changes to DEI and the response it garnered from his employees.
Johnson & Johnson is changing its AI strategy after learning only 10-15% of AI test pilots it had created were creating 80% of the value. The Wall Street Journal has more.
Goldman Sachs investors have nixed several anti-DEI proposals presented at the latest shareholder meeting. Bloomberg has the story.
HR Dive reports that $100k is no longer a high enough salary for a family to meet their basic expenses in 25 of the top cities in the U.S.
Layoffs incoming. Volvo is set to cut 800 jobs, and Intel is preparing to let go of nearly 20% of its workforce. At the same time, according to Fortune, senior leadership is already beginning to feel the effects of cuts to middle management.
CNBC reports on a new Harvard study that shows 42% of Americans under 30 are “barely getting by” financially.
Despite claims that manufacturers would benefit most from Trump’s tariffs, Axios summarized the recently released “Beige Book”, indicating that ongoing uncertainty limits confidence amongst the industry’s leading businesses.
Proctor & Gamble CEO also cited uncertainty, when he announced on CNBC that price hikes for consumers are expected in the next fiscal year.
This chart comes from Axios, and has interesting implications for the healthcare industry. Gen Z is increasingly leaning on friends and family for medical advice as opposed to doctors or online searches. Learn more here.
Regardless of how the market rollercoaster we’re on plays out, the global economy is clearly being fundamentally reshaped. According to many commentators, the possibility of a recession or worse in America and around the world is still real. If tariff-induced inflation gets introduced to the mix, it’s a double whammy for households. And if it accelerates AI adoption, as some think, the pain for workers could compound.
I’ve spent much of the week thinking about what all this means for Just Capital. The argument – captured in this comment by Scott Bessent – that this is all being done to benefit Main Street after decades of neglect warrants careful scrutiny. History teaches us that dislocations invariably tug at society’s fault lines and hit the economically vulnerable (i.e., Main Street) the hardest. Maybe this is different. Overall though, I’m coming to the (admittedly self-serving) conclusion that it makes just company behavior more important, and increases the performance dividend of stakeholder leadership.
Consider this: In the last major market shock during Covid, the most just companies outperformed their peers. From January 31, 2020 through the end of May 2023 the broad based JULCD (the “Just 500”) beat the Russell 1000 by a little over 1% and the Just 100 was up 11.8% over its benchmark. More highly ranked companies also displayed more resilience than their lower ranked counterparts when Covid hit, responding to worker and customer needs more effectively, and bouncing back faster.
Although the current tumult is driven by altogether different causes, I expect just leaders to similarly outshine their rivals (as our index track records suggest). Companies that excel in creating value for all their stakeholders possess greater brand strength, are more long-term growth oriented, prioritize productivity and innovation (including via technology), and are better at attracting and retaining the best people. They have strong cultures, care deeply about their customers, have tighter relationships with local communities and suppliers, and are more adept at navigating social and environmental matters. When market shocks happen, these companies are invariably better positioned. Walmart’s successful customer loyalty program was cited this week as a reason why the company may be more recession-resistant than others (see below for other examples).
Call it what you want – multi-stakeholder capitalism, just capitalism, better capitalism – it’s the kind of leadership that will stand companies in good stead in times of great uncertainty. It’s also the best chance we have of building a better future for America.
Be well,
Martin
Reactions from Trump’s tariffs have run the gamut across companies and investors. Here are just a few from the week.
Ford says they’re “not sweating”, as 80% of their cars are assembled in the U.S., and they’re working with the administration to “help grow jobs here” to assemble even more on U.S. social.
JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon responded to the tariffs in his shareholder letter, saying that “the quicker this issue is resolved, the better”.
Levi’s CEO Michelle Gass assembled a task force to figure out potential options for dealing with the impact of tariffs, saying that any price hikes the company makes will be “surgical”.
Walmart is suspected of being more resilient thanks to its growing “Walmart +” program, which drove nearly half the total spend on the company’s website last year. The subscription service could give Walmart a buffer on raising prices.
Outside of specific companies, CNBC created a round-up of thoughts from several top investors and CEOs (some anonymous) on the impact of the tariffs. The BBC also reported that right now, some workers in middle America have a more positive opinion of the tariffs than business leaders.
Lego proceeded with the opening of a new production complex in Vietnam, reportedly undaunted by tariffs against U.S. trading partners.
(Getty Images/ Kayla Bartkowski)
“For the last four decades, basically since I began my career in Wall Street, Wall Street has grown wealthier than ever before, and it can continue to grow and do well. But for the next four years, the Trump agenda is focused on Main Street. It’s Main Street’s turn. It’s Main Street’s turn to hire workers. It’s Main Street’s turn to drive investment, and it’s Main Street’s turn to restore the American Dream.”
CNBC looks at an alarming trend for companies – scammers using bots and generative AI to pose as qualified job applicants for remote jobs, and then, once hired onto a company, installing malware and ransomware on their servers.
Fortune looks at how Atlassian has bucked the return-to-office trend of other tech companies, and in the process, tripled the size of its workforce and nearly doubled the amount of candidates who apply for open roles. Explore the tenets that make their remote workforce possible.
The Guardian looks at marketing’s role in “woke” backlash to corporate activism, saying, “the contradictions of the brand purpose era are most apparent when looked at from the view of the average person. Social progress once came hand-in-hand with economic progress. Now, instead, social progress has been offered as a substitute for economic progress.” Read the full article here.
Bloomberg reports that TikTok is becoming an even bigger bargaining chip in the growing trade war.
Fortune examines some of the strategies CEOs are starting to implement to weather the tariff storm. Yahoo Finance takes a close look at Starbucks in particular, given that the majority of their coffee is imported from some of the countries receiving the highest tariffs. Meanwhile, a small business owner takes to the New York Times opinion section to discuss pricing woes these tariffs create, stating: “Bizarrely, the U.S. government can scramble its tariff policy faster and with less warning than I can change my retail prices. I face a critical business decision and lack the minimal level of certainty to make it.”
