In the last few days, massive LA wildfires have caused thousands of residents to flee their homes for safety. Accuweather is predicting that the total damage from the fire is already totaling nearly $57 billions, and is certain to grow. And while that sum is enormous, it says nothing about the lives and livelihoods lost in the destruction.
In the wake of such devastation, companies are stepping in to help out the affected communities. We’ll be updating this tracker daily over the next week as more businesses come forward to provide aid.
Here is what we have seen so far: (Updated 1/21/24)
Airbnb is working with the LA government to offer free housing to evacuees.
Amazon has pledged $10 million to disaster response groups dealing with the fires.
AT&T is offering free talk, text, and data to residents in affected billing zipcodes on Feb 6th.
Bank of America commits $1 million to the Red Cross to assist those impacted by the wildfires.
Disney is committing $15 million to immediate response and rebuilding efforts.
Fox Corporation is donating $1 million to the Red Cross for relief efforts.
Instacart is waiving delivery fees for all grocery and daily essential deliveries in affected areas.
Kroger is raising $1 million for people impacted by the fires.
Lockheed Martin is donating $1 million to Los Angeles relief and recovery efforts.
Planet Fitness gym has opened its facilities from now until Jan. 15, providing access to wi-fi, showers, facilities, and more.
Skechers gives $1 million to relief efforts.
Sweetgreen is delivering free meals to firefighters, first responders, and those displaced by the fire.
Verizon is waiving domestic call/data/text usage from until January 16th for those affected, and is deploying wi-fi and charging stations at shelters.
Uber is offering free rides of up to $40 for those evacuating, while Lyft will offer two rides up to $25 each ($50 total).
U-Haul is opening its facilities for 30-days of free self-storage to those who have to flee their homes.
Walmart is committing $2.5 million to relief efforts.
On a local level, many restaurants around LA are offering free meals to evacuees.
May 30, 2022
In the two years since the killing of George Floyd and other Black Americans ignited a national reckoning with racial injustice, dozens of America’s largest companies have made unprecedented commitments to advancing racial equity in their workplaces and communities. Last year, we began tracking these commitments – as well as the concrete actions corporate America was beginning to take – as part of our 2021 Corporate Racial Equity Tracker. Below, we’ve updated our Tracker with the latest corporate performance data on these issues, tracking whether companies are making progress toward their goals, two years on.
With our recent survey research showing that 92% of Americans overall (up from 79% last year) and 95% of Black Americans believe it is important for companies to promote racial diversity and equity in the workplace, the demand for action on corporate commitments has only increased – especially considering that 68% of Americans, and 87% of Black Americans, agree companies have more work to do.
The 2022 Tracker offers an in-depth accounting of the commitments and actions announced by the 100 largest U.S. employers, through 23 metrics across six specific dimensions of racial equity:
Across the 85 companies that we tracked in both 2021 and 2022, we saw the greatest increases in disclosure on workforce and board diversity data, as well as pay equity – areas where we’ve also seen rising pressure from investors:
But corporate America continues to lag behind on many issues. Across the 100 companies we tracked in 2022, we found that only:
Over time, the Tracker will continue to evolve, growing to feature more Russell 1000 companies as well as additional actions related to racial equity. We will also continue to build on our broader racial equity initiative, providing updated guidance to corporate leaders – like our 2021 CEO Blueprint for Racial Equity – as well as additional issue analyses and insights on leading practices related to our findings.
Delve into the Tracker below:
This Tracker uses information primarily found on company websites, corporate press releases, sustainability reports, diversity, equity, and inclusion reports, and company SEC filings to evaluate what steps America’s largest public employers – the 100 largest companies by U.S. employment size in the Russell 1000 Index – have taken to promote racial equity. The Tracker currently looks at six dimensions, or “tags,” of company commitments or actions related to racial equity, ranging from community investments to pay equity.
When a company meets the criteria for a particular response (listed below), it receives a “tag” in the Tracker above, indicating that it has disclosed that commitment or action. Each tag links to the original data source. By using the “Drill Down” feature, you can explore more detailed information about a company’s response: for example, by filtering by the tag “Response to Mass Incarceration,” you can find out if a company discloses multiple policies, including a Re-Entry Policy, a Company Anti-Prison Labor Policy, or a Supplier Anti-Prison Labor Policy. The six dimensions – and their underlying metrics – include:
Anti-Discrimination Policies: Company discloses an anti-harassment policy, racial and ethnic diversity targets, and/or implements anti-harassment training, a discrimination grievance mechanism, or a harassment grievance mechanism. A harassment grievance mechanism is what a company implements for employees to submit harassment or sexual harassment concerns whereas a discrimination grievance mechanism is for employees to safely report concerns or issues relating to discrimination more broadly.
Community Investments: Company discloses the dollar amount spent on diverse suppliers and local suppliers, and/or the company provides funding for local schools. Funding for local education measures whether the company donates to educational programs for primary or secondary school, excluding employee donation-matching programs to schools and scholarships.
Education and Training Programs: Company provides tuition assistance, an apprenticeship program, and/or company discloses its internal hiring rate by race or ethnicity or the average hours of training or career development per employee. Internal hiring rate by race or ethnicity measures whether a company publicly discloses the proportion of vacancies that have been filled from current employees disaggregated by race and ethnicity.
Pay Equity: Company conducts a pay equity analysis to examine pay discrepancies between white and racially or ethnically diverse employees. Drill down to explore details about the frequency of analysis, whether or not a company discloses the results of its pay equity analysis, as well as its adjusted People of Color-to-White pay ratio. For example, if a company reports that employees who identify as racially and ethnically diverse make $0.94 for every dollar employees who identify as white make, the People of Color-to-White pay ratio disclosed would be $0.94.
Racial/Ethnic Diversity Data: Company discloses workforce and/or board demographic data. Board demographic data is measured as disclosure of board racial or ethnic diversity as well as the disclosed percent of racially or ethnically diverse directors on a company’s board. Company workforce demographic data is measured by three different levels of detail: Overall People of Color Data, Detailed Race/Ethnicity Data, and EEO-1 Report or Intersectional Data by Gender and Race/Ethnicity. Overall People of Color Data indicates that the company has disclosed information about the overall number or share of racially or ethnically diverse workers without disaggregating the data by race/ethnicity groups; Detailed Race/Ethnicity Data indicates that a company has disclosed the number or share of workers for at least one racially or ethnically diverse group such as Asian, Black, or Latinx, among others; and EEO-1 Report or Intersectional Data by Gender and Race/Ethnicity indicates that a company has disclosed the number or share of workers by gender, as well as by race or ethnicity, or information that would typically be found in an EEO-1 Report.
Response to Mass Incarceration: Company discloses a re-entry policy, anti-prison labor policy, and/or supplier anti-prison labor policy. A re-entry or fair chance policy is defined as a policy that removes employment barriers for people with criminal records. Anti-prison labor and supplier anti-prison labor policies are counted when a company explicitly bans voluntary or involuntary prison labor in its operations and in its supply chain, respectively.
Each corporation’s number of U.S. employees is based on the company’s total employment count in 2020 if business in the U.S. accounted for more than 95% of revenues or long-term assets. These headcounts are further adjusted for all additions of employees through acquired businesses or subtractions of employees through divested businesses. In cases where the U.S. headcount is not disclosed in company filings or publicly available material, we estimate the total U.S. employment size by multiplying the global employment size by the ratio of U.S. sales and long-term assets to global sales and long-term assets.
The Corporate Racial Equity Tracker was originally released in April 2021. We have continued to track the same six dimensions in 2022 but expanded or refined the underlying metrics within three of the six dimensions to better capture corporate transparency and actions supporting racial equity. Within the Anti-Discrimination Policies dimension, we substituted the general quantitative diversity targets metric with a more granular race and ethnicity diversity targets metric to shine a light on corporate commitments as they relate to race and ethnicity specifically. Additionally, we removed the EEO Policy metric in favor of more performance-oriented metrics. Within the Education and Training Programs dimension, we removed the career development program metric and added two metrics that capture corporate transparency on equitable outcomes of a career development program: average hours of training or career development per employee and disclosure on internal hiring or promotions by race or ethnicity. Similarly, within the Community Investments dimension, we replaced supplier diversity policy and local sourcing policy metrics with diverse supplier and local supplier spend disclosure metrics to measure if companies are sharing the extent to which they support diverse and local suppliers. We also updated the stringency of our funding for local education metric to only capture companies that donate funds or infrastructural materials to primary or secondary schools, excluding providing ad-hoc educational materials and other non-infrastructural forms of assistance. Instead of analyzing disclosure on general policies, we have included metrics that assess if companies are transparent about how and to what degree their policies support employees and communities of color.
In addition, the Tracker universe has changed over time because of differences between the 2020 and, previously, 2019 U.S. employment count used to identify the 100 largest U.S. employers. As a result, the 2022 Tracker has 85 overlapping companies with the 2021 Tracker, with 15 new companies not included in last year’s Tracker.
All data supporting this Tracker has been updated as recently as May 2022. The Tracker was last updated on May 31, 2022 at 6AM ET.
Following last summer’s reckoning with racial injustice, prompted by the brutal killings of Black Americans and the devastating economic and health impacts of COVID-19 to communities of color, corporate leaders began to publicly acknowledge the ways in which systemic racism impacts their workforces, their communities, and society.
These events also shifted the public’s perceptions of corporate responsibility. In our recent survey research with The Harris Poll, we learned that 95% of Black Americans believe it’s important for companies to promote racial equity – defined by our program partner PolicyLink as “just and fair inclusion into a society in which all people can participate, prosper, and reach their full potential” – and 80% believe they can do more.
In this unprecedented moment, workers, customers, communities, and investors are calling on corporate America to drive change, but it continues to be challenging to assess how companies are taking concrete action to advance racial equity in America today.
JUST Capital has launched this Tracker to fill that gap and incentivize companies to take meaningful steps to advance racial equity. The first iteration offers an in-depth accounting of the state of disclosure by the 100 largest U.S. employers, through 23 data points across six specific dimensions of racial equity:
A high-level analysis of the underlying data reveals that the nation’s 100 largest employers are more likely to disclose baseline DEI commitments, but less likely to disclose actions that show accountability toward progress. You can see how those distinctions break down in the data visualization below which provides a snapshot of the commitments and actions taken by the companies to date. Over time we will evolve the Tracker to feature more Russell 1000 companies, as well as additional actions related to racial equity.
This Tracker uses information primarily found on company websites, corporate press releases, sustainability reports, diversity, equity, and inclusion reports, and company SEC filings to evaluate what steps America’s largest public employers – the 100 largest companies by U.S. employment size in the Russell 1000 Index – have taken to promote racial equity. The Tracker currently looks at six dimensions, or “tags,” of company commitments or actions related to racial equity, ranging from community investments to pay equity.
When a company meets the criteria for a particular response (listed below), it receives a “tag” in the Tracker above, indicating that it has disclosed that commitment or action. Each tag links to the original data source. By using the “Drill Down” feature, you can explore more detailed information about a company’s response: for example, by filtering by the tag “Anti-Discrimination Policies,” you can find out if a company discloses multiple policies, including an Equal Employment Opportunity (EEO) policy, discrimination grievance mechanisms, or anti-harassment policy. The six dimensions – and their underlying details – include:
Anti-Discrimination Policies: Company discloses an EEO (or diversity and opportunity) policy, quantitative diversity targets, discrimination grievance mechanisms, a harassment grievance mechanism, and/or an anti-harassment policy. A harassment grievance mechanism is what a company implements for employees to submit harassment or sexual harassment concerns whereas a discrimination grievance mechanism is for employees to safely report concerns or issues relating to discrimination more generally.
Community Investments: Company implements a supplier diversity policy, local sourcing policy, and/or funding for local schools.
Education and Training Programs: Company provides apprenticeship programs, tuition assistance, and/or a career development program to its employees.
Pay Equity: Company conducts a pay equity analysis to examine pay discrepancies between white and non-white employees. Drill down to explore details about the frequency of analysis, whether or not a company discloses the results of its pay equity analysis, as well as the ratio of non-white to white employee pay. For example, if a company reports that employees who identify as non-white make $0.94 for every dollar a white employee makes, the non-white ratio disclosed would be $0.94.
Racial/Ethnic Diversity Data: Company discloses workforce demographic data and/or board demographic data. Board demographic data is measured as disclosure of board racial/ethnic diversity as well as the disclosed percent of non-white directors or director nominees on a company’s board. Company workforce demographic data is measured as three different levels of detail: Non-White Data, Detailed Data, and Intersectional Data. Non-White Data indicates that the company has disclosed general information about the number or share of non-white (often described as “minority”) workers; Detailed Data indicates that a company has at least disclosed either the number or share of workers who identify as Asian, Black, or Latinx; and Intersectional Data indicates that a company has disclosed the number or share of workers by gender, as well as by race and ethnicity, or information that would typically be found in an EEO-1 Report.
Response to Mass Incarceration: Company discloses a re-entry policy, anti-prison labor policy, and/or a supplier anti-prison labor policy. A re-entry or fair chance policy is defined as a policy that removes employment barriers for people with criminal records. Anti-prison labor and supplier anti-prison labor policies are counted when a company explicitly bans voluntary or involuntary prison labor in its operations and in its supply chain, respectively.
Each corporation’s number of U.S. employees is based on the company’s total employment count in 2019 if business in the U.S. accounted for more than 95% of revenues or long-term assets. These headcounts are further adjusted for all additions of employees through acquired businesses or subtractions of employees through divested businesses. In cases where the U.S. headcount is not disclosed in company filings or publicly available material, we estimate the total U.S. employment size by multiplying the global employment size by the ratio of U.S. sales and long-term assets to global sales and long-term assets.
Much of the data found in this Tracker was collected as part of our 2020 and 2021 Rankings data collection efforts. Data on Pay Equity and Workforce Demographic Data have been updated as recently as March 2021.Data on Disclosure of Board Diversity as well as data a newly added data point on the Percent of Non-white Directors or Director Nominees have been updated as recently as June 11, 2021. The Tracker was last updated on June 30 2021 at 6:00 PM EST.
Over the course of this year, the coronavirus and economic crises have created an urgent, unprecedented opportunity for CEOs and corporate leaders to put purpose-driven leadership and stakeholder capitalism into practice. Companies have faced extraordinary operational and financial challenges, and with every industry and business tested in unique ways, we’ve seen corporate leaders take distinct courses of action to address the needs of their stakeholders – particularly their workers, customers, and local communities – throughout the crisis. And with the national reckoning with racial injustice that rocked our country this summer – and in the midst of the contested 2020 election and mounting challenges to democracy – there is an even greater urgency to implement policies and practices that support all Americans – including Black and Brown people who have been disproportionately impacted by the coronavirus crisis.
We created this Tracker in March – starting with America’s 100 largest public employers and evolving to the full Russell 1000 universe of employers as of November 5 – to help assess what’s happening on the ground. In addition, our COVID-19 platform includes data analysis on key issues (paid sick leave, hazard pay), polling insights from our ongoing survey work with The Harris Poll, as well as corporate leadership stories, interviews, and events.
The chart below provides a snapshot of the types of actions Russell 1000 companies have taken to date in response to the pandemic, with the comprehensive interactive tracker beneath it.
Delve into the COVID-19 Corporate Response Tracker below.
The Tracker now features the actions of the 928 Russell 1000 companies included in our 2021 Rankings of America’s Most Just Companies. The underlying data have been updated as of August 31, 2020, though all data pertain to companies’ early responses to the pandemic, a period of time that we have defined as March 1 to June 26, 2020. We will continue to update this data beyond the initial early response phase with any new data provided by companies. In this iteration of the tracker, a value of “No” indicates that a company has confirmed, through our annual corporate engagement process, that it did not implement that policy or practice in response to the COVID-19 pandemic.
This tracker uses information found on company websites, corporate press releases, and reputable news sources to evaluate what America’s largest public employers – companies in the Russell 1000 index – did as part of their initial response to the COVID-19 pandemic. The tracker currently looks at 20 dimensions, or “tags,” of company response – from the provision or expansion of paid sick leave policies to layoffs and furloughs.
When a company meets criteria for a particular response (listed below), it receives a “tag” in the tracker above, indicating that it has announced that policy or practice. Each tag links to the original data source. By using the “Drill Down” feature, you can explore more detailed information about a company’s response – for example, by filtering by the tag “Community Relief Fund,” you can find out how much a company has committed or donated to helping communities or organizations with relief efforts. The 20 tags – and their underlying details – include:
Adjusted Hours of Operation: Company is adjusting the hours of operation of some or all of its services or retail or branch locations.
Back-Up Dependent Care: Company is offering back-up dependent care services to employees or providing additional paid time off for employees dealing with school closures or interruptions in existing care arrangements.
Closed Stores or Suspended Services: Company is voluntarily closing some or all of its retail or branch locations or suspending some or all of its operations or services. Drill down to explore details about which locations or services are impacted, whether companies are continuing to pay employees – hourly or otherwise – affected by store closures or service suspensions, what percent of base pay these employees are being paid, and whether contract workers are also receiving pay during store closures or service suspensions.
Community Relief Fund: Company is committing funds to help communities or organizations dealing with relief efforts. Drill down to explore details about how much a company has given or pledged in cash contributions to COVID-19 relief.
Community Services: Company is providing direct in-person or in-kind community services to help with relief efforts, such as organizing food banks, blood drives, or even providing free softwares for schools.
Corporate Leadership: Company's leadership has taken actions to mitigate financial risks and support the well-being of workers, customers, and communities during the COVID-19 pandemic. Drill down to explore details about whether a company’s CEO, C-Suite executives, and/or board members are taking a pay cut, and how much of their pay (as a percent) is being cut.
Customer Accommodations: Company is offering special accommodations to customers. Drill down to explore whether companies are offering discounts or price cuts to their customers, allowing customers to defer payment of goods and services, continuing to provide essential utilities to customers who are unable to make payments at this time, and/or providing services to vulnerable populations such as reserving the first hour of shopping for high-risk customers.
Financial Assistance: Company is offering a grant, bonus, wage increase, or other financial assistance to employees to help curb income volatility as a result of changes in hours of operation, closures, or service suspensions, or reward workers who are on the frontlines risking their health and safety to keep business running. Drill down to explore details about whether a company is adding funds or expanding eligibility for its employee grant programs, whether a company is offering a one-time bonus to employees and the minimum and maximum amounts available to them, whether a company has increased hourly wages permanently or temporarily for its employees and the amount by which wages have been increased, as well as whether a company has increased overtime pay, and if so, at what rate.
Furloughs or Unpaid Leave: Company has announced furloughs – an employer-mandated suspension of work without pay – or other types of employer-mandated unpaid leave in order to offset lost revenues. Drill down to explore details about how many weeks the furlough is expected to last, the number or percent of employees impacted, whether a company is continuing to provide employees with their health care benefits during the furlough, and whether a company is providing additional support for furloughed workers. These additional supports range from fully covering health care premiums for workers (a step beyond just continuing to provide health care benefits) to setting furloughed employees up with temporary jobs at other companies.
Government Support: Company is participating in a government program or receiving financial aid to support its workers and business. Drill down to explore whether a company is accepting government aid under the CARES Act, how much in government aid they are poised to receive, and whether a company is participating in Short Time Compensation or work share programs to protect against layoffs.
Health and Safety: Company announced added health and safety measures during the pandemic to protect workers and customers alike. Drill down to explore details about whether a company has implemented additional health and safety precautions and/or provided free personal protective equipment (PPE) – such as masks or gloves – for its workers.
Hiring Workers: Company announced or is actively offering new job opportunities for workers facing unemployment during the pandemic in order to address increased community demand. Drill down to explore details about how many workers companies are planning to hire and whether these positions are permanent or temporary.
Layoffs: Company announced layoffs in order to offset lost revenues. At this time, we are working to track how many workers are affected by layoffs. Drill down to explore details about the number or percent of employees laid off and whether a company offered a severance package, provided outplacement services like resume workshops or career counseling to laid off employees, or committed to rehiring laid off employees.
Non-Executive Pay Cuts: Company is cutting pay for non-executive level employees. Drill down to explore details about whether a company has announced cutting the pay of its non-C-suite employees, and if so by what percentage.
Paid Sick Leave: Company is expanding its paid sick leave policies or developing a new paid sick leave policy for workers who have been infected by COVID-19 or are under quarantine for COVID-19. Drill down to explore details about whether a company’s paid sick leave offering was an expansion or a response to COVID-19 only, how many days of paid sick leave are available to workers, what percent of base pay workers are being paid while on sick leave, and whether there are barriers – such as requiring an official diagnosis or a positive test result – to accessing paid sick leave. In cases where companies disclose the number of weeks of paid sick leave available to workers, we assume that each week contains five working days (1 week of paid sick leave = 5 days of paid sick leave). In other cases where companies disclose the number of hours of paid sick leave available to workers, we assume that each day contains eight hours of work (40 hours of paid sick leave = 5 days of paid sick leave).
Production, Distribution, or Logistical Support: Company is shifting operations to prioritize production, distribution, or logistical support for COVID-19 related products. Drill down to explore details about whether a company is producing or manufacturing goods and services related to the fight against the pandemic, procuring or distributing goods and services (such as cleaning supplies or food) to meet increased demand , and/or engaging in logistical activities (such as transporting products between producers and distributors or developing applications) and whether these production, distribution, or logistical supports are being provided for free or donated by the company.
Relaxed Attendance Policies: Company is relaxing its attendance policies for employees who are at higher risk of being infected with COVID-19, are uncomfortable with coming into work during the pandemic, or have become infected. Drill down to explore details about whether companies are offering unpaid sick leave and/or waiving their absenteeism policies for employees who miss work during the pandemic.
Remote Work and Modified Schedules: Company is voluntarily shifting its nonessential employees to a remote work or work-from-home arrangement in response to the pandemic or are enacting alternative scheduling practices. Drill down to explore details about whether a company is voluntarily shifting its nonessential employees to a remote work or work-from-home arrangement and/or modifying employees’ work schedules by enacting A/B scheduling, staggered shifts, split shifts, or another alternative for health and safety reasons.
Supply Chain Impacts: Company has announced information about impacts or adjustments to its supply chain, including whether there have been job cuts or the company has made a commitment to maintain business.
Voluntary Leave: Company is establishing a program by which an employee can take a leave of absence from work for a set amount of time – either paid or unpaid – in order to help the company reduce operating expenses. Drill down to explore whether such a policy exists, the length of the leave offered, whether it is paid or unpaid, and the potential pay rate.
Each corporation’s number of U.S. employees is based on the company’s total employment count in 2019 if business in the U.S. accounted for more than 95% of revenues or long-term assets. These headcounts are further adjusted for all additions of employees through acquired businesses or subtractions of employees through divested businesses. In cases where the U.S. headcount is not disclosed in company filings or publicly available material, we estimate the total U.S. employment size by multiplying the global employment size by the ratio of U.S. sales and long-term assets to global sales and long-term assets.
Data collection began on March 19, 2020, and the Tracker was last updated on August 31, 2020 at 6:00 PM EST.
JUNE 9 UPDATE: The Tracker is now following the actions of America’s 301 largest employers, and has expanded to include two new corporate actions, as well as several new dimensions to existing actions that companies are taking in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. In addition to increasing the number of companies we track, here are the specific changes to what we’re assessing:
APRIL 22 UPDATE: The tracker expanded to feature three new tags, as well as several new drill down details to existing corporate actions that companies are taking in response to the COVID-19 pandemic. Here’s what has changed:
MARCH 31 UPDATE included the ability to drill down to see more detailed information on a number of key actions. For example select “Paid Sick Leave” from the “Drill Down” drop-down menu to see details about whether a company’s paid sick leave offering was an expansion or a response to COVID-19 only, how many days of paid sick leave are available to workers, which workers are eligible, and what percent of base pay workers are being paid while on sick leave.
Just Capital is tracking corporate actions in response to the COVID-19 crisis and elevating best practices to incentivize better business behavior. Make a gift today to help us accelerate and amplify this urgent work.
