Walmart and eBay oppose shareholder resolutions to disclose gender pay gap

Online marketplace eBay has said it will oppose a shareholder proposal that would require it to disclose any gap in gender pay.

Arjuna Capital, a sustainable wealth management arm of investment adviser Baldwin Brothers, announced Thursday that it had filed the proposal, which requests that eBay publicly report the pay disparity between its male and female employees and set goals to close any gaps.

The company responded that it would oppose the resolution, which it said is not in the best interest of its stockholders, according to Natasha Lamb, Arjuna Capital’s director of equity research and shareholder engagement. Ebay did not respond to the Guardian’s requests for comment, but confirmed in the San Francisco Chronicle that it plans to oppose the proposal.

Lamb disagrees that the proposal wouldn’t be in shareholders’ best interests. “The eBay proposal is clearly in the interest of enhancing shareholder value,” she said in a press statement. “Gender diversity is a key driver of innovation and performance, factors of particular importance to the tech industry.”

Women make up 42% of eBay’s employees and 28% of its leadership, according to diversity figures the company released last year as part of a flurry of diversity reporting among tech firms (starting with Google).

Citing lawsuits, Walmart moves to block vote on gender pay

The eBay news comes after Walmart opposed a similar proposal late last month.

That proposal was submitted by Cynthia Murray, a 15-year employee of a Walmart store in Laurel, Maryland, who owns almost 70 shares of the company’s common stock and belongs to Our Walmart, a worker organization that has been lobbying for higher wage and better schedules at the company.

“Murray’s resolution would require Walmart to disclose, for each pay grade and salary range: the proportion of men and women in each grade and range, the average hours worked by men and women and the average hourly wage rates of men and women,” according to the press release.

Shareholders are currently scheduled to vote on the resolution at the company’s annual meeting in June. That is, if it is included in the 2015 proxy materials at all.

On 30 January, Walmart filed a no-action letter with the US Securities and Exchange Commission in response to Murray’s proposal, asking for a permission to exclude the letter from its 2015 proxy materials “because the proposal relates to the company’s litigation strategy”.

“[T]he company believes that disclosure of the information requested by the proposal would adversely affect the company’s litigation strategy in a number of pending lawsuits and claims alleging gender-based discrimination in pay,” according to the 11-page letter filed with the SEC (pdf).

The letter goes on to say that, so far, Walmart has had “no adverse judgment against the company in any of these matters” and is determined to keep it that way.

Every company’s management has a responsibility to defend the company’s interest against unwarranted litigation. A shareholder proposal that interferes with this obligation is inappropriate, particularly when the company is involved in pending litigation on the very issues that form the basis for the proposal.”

Simply put, Walmart believes that publicly disclosing information about its pay, broken down by gender, could threaten its standing in a number of pending gender discrimination lawsuits.

In her proxy proposal (pdf), Murray references the lawsuits as exactly the reason why the company should disclose information about its pay.

“Walmart has faced charges of widespread gaps in pay between men and women doing similar jobs,” she writes. “Thus, we are concerned about possible reputational damage.”

Even as Walmart attempts to keep its pay information confidential, company spokesperson Randy Hargrove claims it continues “to be a great place for women to work and advance”.

“[W]e have a long history of providing advancement opportunities for our female associates,” he told the Guardian. “In fact, we have created specific training and mentoring programs to help prepare women for opportunities at all levels in our company.”

A moot point?

Even if the proposal ends up on the proxy, of course, there is no guarantee that shareholders would vote for it.

Walmart shareholders are unlikely to vote in favor of a proxy proposal that could cause Walmart to lose in court or paint the company in a negative light, causing its value to drop.

“In general, shareholders tend to be more supportive of resolutions seeking disclosures of information that might be useful to investors; less supportive of prescriptive proposals seeking specific action,” said Carol Bowie, head of Institutional Shareholders Services’ Americas Research group.

While proxy proposals calling for release of pay by gender are uncommon, “the issue of increasing gender diversity has been a proposal topic for many years”, she added.

But the issue is certainly receiving more attention now.

During his State of the Union address, US President Barack Obama renewed his call for equal pay, saying: “Women deserve equal pay for equal work.” Last weekend, Patricia Arquette used her Oscar acceptance speech for best actress to raise awareness about the issue.

“Gender pay equality is not only one of the biggest social injustice issues of our time, but clearly a business issue whose time has come,” Lamb said in a statement. “We want to invest in companies committed to the innovation and success diversity fosters.”

• This article was amended on 6 March. Due to an editing error, a previous version incorrectly attributed a paragraph about Walmart shareholders being unlikely to vote for the proxy proposal to Carol Bowie, head of Institutional Shareholders Services’ Americas Research group. In fact, that point was analysis by the reporter.