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.
Amid ongoing macroeconomic uncertainty and emerging AI-driven labor market disruptions, workforce leaders face the dual challenge of investing meaningfully in their workforce and demonstrating their value proposition to meet rising employee expectations.
What do Americans want from their employers? The public tells us year after year that fair wages matter most, but they also clearly indicate that pay alone doesn’t define a good job. Across every demographic group, Americans consistently prioritize benefits, worker well-being, ethical leadership, and transparent communication as hallmarks of just companies.
The Just Jobs Performance Tracker supports Russell 1000 leaders facing tough decisions on their human capital strategy through comprehensive access to benchmarking data and leading workforce practices. This singular destination is built to help enhance job quality, strengthen recruitment and retention, and unlock organizational excellence.
The business case for Just jobs is compelling: As of June 11, 2025 Just Capital’s Workers Index has outperformed its Russell 1000 benchmark by 16.6% since its inception in December 2021. The Workers Index tracks the top 20% of Russell 1000 companies with high performance on Worker issues in the annual Ranking of America’s Most JUST Companies.
This Performance Tracker is the third iteration of a tool formerly known as the JUST Jobs Scorecard, building on earlier versions with updated company data, refreshed benchmarks, and an enhanced peer comparison feature to provide deeper insight. It is accessible within the JUST Intelligence platform.
The JUST Jobs Performance Tracker enables companies to assess disclosure and performance on 27 data points across five key topic areas that are foundational to quality jobs: Wages & Compensation; Benefits; Hiring & Stability; Training & Development; Employee Wellness & Belonging. To develop the JUST Jobs Performance Tracker, JUST Capital assessed corporate disclosure and performance on these data points, scoring companies on a continuum of practice from 0 points for no disclosure through 4 points for leading practice.
Companies earn JUST Jobs Leadership designation by achieving an overall average score at or above 3.00, and can earn Top Performer status through earning a perfect 4.00 on all data points within any one topic area or Top in Industry for achieving the highest average score for their industry on the data points in a given topic area.
Additional methodological details can be found here.
Here are our findings:
The Just Jobs Performance Tracker, based on data collected through November 2024, reveals a continued overall trend of steady employee policy transparency and workforce investment despite early indications of an evolving social and political environment.
Notably, the proportion of companies earning the lowest possible score (0.00) decreased for every topic, indicating attention to disclosure across key job categories.
And disclosure rates in the tracker increased between 2024 and 2025 for almost all data points. The following saw some of the more notable jumps, indicating an increased focus on building a robust talent pipeline:
Pressure around non-financial reporting has become even more complex between 2024 and 2025. So far, in 2025, our ongoing tracking of key disclosures – including workforce policies – indicates that company impact report releases are down by 27% compared to this time last year. It is too early to say whether this is a delay or a retreat. While company leaders have told us they are being more cautious about how and when they communicate their stakeholder efforts in today’s environment, the work continues internally. Corporate leaders tell us they’re being more strategic about tying every initiative directly to business value and managing legal risks. We expect to have clearer visibility on how this context impacts disclosure trends by Q4.
This business-based caution stands in contrast to our understanding of public demand for transparency. Our survey work finds increased support year over year for disclosure across all categories – including minimum wage and average wage for different worker demographic groups. Meanwhile, the American public ranked “Communicates transparently” as the #4 priority issue for business behavior in 2024, followed by “Provides benefits and work life balance” and “Supports workforce advancement and training”.
Representation of overall Just Jobs leadership across industries demonstrates a continued investment in job quality and disclosure across the U.S. workforce.
Consistent with 2024, the Just Jobs Leaders each represent a different industry with a range in workforce compositions:
Three companies were just shy of reaching the overall average score required to be named an overall JUST Jobs Leader, but still outperformed their peers:
Company disclosure tends to lag across industries on all but a few Wages & Compensation metrics. With wage-related issues as the American public’s top priority, especially amidst rising cost of living, this provides an area in which companies can take advantage of an existing transparency gap and emphasize their employee value proposition.
Additionally, while companies are sharpening their benefits policies and improving offerings for employees, few in the JUST Jobs Performance Tracker are providing what experts and company examples indicate is leading practice. By investing in comprehensive benefits and transparent communication, companies can stand out in meeting the expectations of the American workforce.
A few key policies with wide-ranging public support have relatively low disclosure, and indicate where companies looking to demonstrate leadership can differentiate themselves through disclosure of existing policies:
The transparency gaps and opportunities outlined above reflect a broader shift in the American employment landscape, one that has significant implications for the current administration’s domestic job creation goals. While the administration has prioritized reshoring manufacturing jobs and creating employment opportunities domestically, our polling reveals that Americans aren’t simply seeking any employment — they’re searching for quality positions that offer genuine value and security.
Manufacturing — a focal point in the administration’s job creation strategy — presents a mixed picture of job quality in the JUST Jobs Performance Tracker. Key manufacturing industries such as Aerospace & Defense, Automobile & Parts, Energy Equipment & Services, Semiconductors & Equipment, and Utilities show a wide range in performance across core job quality metrics.
While these industries tend to score well on Training & Development and Employee Wellness & Belonging, they lag on Wages & Compensation and Benefits — two areas workers consistently rank as top priorities. Even within lower-performing topics, variation exists: Energy Equipment & Services’s top Wages and Benefits scores are among the lowest across all industries on both compensation-related topics, whereas Utilities performs relatively well on Wages & Compensation, and Semiconductors & Equipment is strong on Benefits.
Utility companies may offer a positive blueprint for building JUST Jobs among a domestic workforce. Although there is significant room for improvement on key job quality practices and disclosures, Utilities led all 36 industries in the Just Capital universe with the highest average overall score. American Water Works achieved Just Jobs Leadership designation, leading the industry in Training & Development and Employee Wellness & Belonging. Another domestic utility company American Electric Power is top in the Utilities industry on Wages & Compensations and discloses key benefits including paid parental leave, sick leave, and paid time off.
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.”
Perhaps the most surprising result from our most recent survey was the rise in importance of ethical leadership. The American people, it seems, are craving more morality from their leaders. Doubtless many of you are immediately drawn to think about politics and government, but the importance of moral leadership in business is clearly just as vital.
What does it mean to lead with morality? Probably best to ask Perplexity or Chat GPT. The word itself derives from the Latin ‘moralitas’, meaning manner, character, or proper behavior. Applied to companies, the American people associate it with being transparent, honest, taking responsibility for wrongdoings and in a wider sense, doing right by all stakeholders. The HOW Institute for Society, founded and led by our good friend Dov Seidman, has examined the issue in great detail and comes to a similar conclusion that moral leaders seek truth, uphold ethical standards, and demonstrate humility (among other principles). In their most recent report, they highlight character and trust as being central to “outbehaving” the competition and, in turn, outperforming them, and detail a structure for measuring and scaling such leadership.
In today’s hyper-turbulent world, morality also represents a fixed point by which business leaders can navigate. Such was obvious last week, when we presented the Just Capital inaugural Lifetime Achievement Award to Enrique Lores, President and CEO of HP, Inc. Read more here. In Enrique’s words, “As business leaders, we have a choice. We can follow – or we can lead. We can react to change – or we can shape it. At HP, we are choosing to lead…companies that lead with purpose don’t just endure. They thrive.”
Just leaders have this philosophy in common: they serve a set of consistent, foundational values that guide them over the long term, through good times and bad, through fair weather and foul. We hope you are as inspired by Enrique’s leadership as we are.
Be well,
Martin
PS. If you’re looking for an exploration of morality in a modern context, I’d recommend the BBC’s Moral Maze podcast (it has grappled with morality in business many times).
Mar 27, 2025 12:00 PM
In today’s rapidly changing environment, both investors and consumers are applying new criteria when evaluating companies and their leadership. What do Americans expect from business leaders right now, and how are these expectations reshaping corporate priorities and investment decisions?
Join JUST Capital, alongside Potential Energy, for an exclusive, data-driven discussion that bridges the gap between public sentiment and business strategy, delivering actionable insights based on extensive research with investors, consumers, and market leaders.
(Photo by Adam Hamer)
“When corporate leaders prioritize responsible investment for all stakeholders, like job creation, workforce development like veterans hiring and apprenticeships, and training programs, they contribute to addressing critical challenges such as underemployment, income inequality, and healthcare access, so fewer Americans have to rely on “Renting Tires”.
Axios reports that recent studies are showing that AI is driving a major wedge between the c-suite and employees. Why? Beyond the fears of AI job replacement, many execs are forcing employees to adopt AI tools that workers themselves find aren’t suited to the job, in many cases providing inaccurate answers that require a significant amount of time to correct. Read the full story here.
Business Insider looks at how a push to “dominate AI” across the tech industry is drastically changing the culture of a sector once known for its job security.
HR Brew unveils their DEI tracker, which is keeping a pulse on how companies are rethinking, rebranding, or rolling back their initiatives. Meanwhile, Inc. looks at why small businesses are actually having greater success with their DEI initiatives.
The Wall Street Journal reports that consumer spending is weakening across both rich and poor, luxuries and necessities, at the same time.
This chart comes from The Wall Street Journal, and shows the salary increases that were previously common with a job switch have dropped to their lowest level in years, providing little more income for most people than their current job. Explore the data here.
