Investing
in the Labor Movement:
The Center for Working Capital
by Jeff Burman
There is something new at the AFL-CIO. Its Center for Working Capital has begun to take advantage of a remarkably powerful force, long overlooked by organized labor: the enormous assets held by unions. Assets that amount to more than $6 trillion. Assets accumulated through union pension funds, stock ownership and 401(k) funds. The CWC's hope is to enhance shareholder value through coordinated efforts, and to take advantage of proxy voting rights to reflect the interests of working men and women.
"During this decade, multi-employer and public-employee funds have changed the contours of corporate governance in this country. They have helped achieve greater accountability of corporate management to shareholders... and increased management awareness that workplace and human-rights issues are important to long-term corporate competitiveness and fund performance," writes John J. Sweeney, president of the AFL-CIO.
Smart investing can do many things. It can help reshape policy in corporations that have adversarial relationships with unions; and it can also reward companies that have enlightened relationships with their employees.
All too often, corporations today are so focused on maximizing shareholder value to become more competitive in the global economy that their subsequent downsizing and restructuring leads to lost jobs, lower wages and lower living standards. The CWC offers an alternative to this "business as usual" practice. It seeks to divert workers' pension funds away from what it calls "corporate America's low-road travelers... [as] they destroy jobs and undermine the retirement security of America's workers and their families."
How will the Center provide us with a voice to ensure that our assets serve our interests? For starters, the CWC is a resource for fund managers. It holds seminars "focusing on worker-enhancing capital strategies, investment practices, shareholder advocacy and employee ownership options." It offers financial and legal consulting. It collects data and performs analysis on current proxy voting issues, offering its findings on investments that are favorable to workers. It evaluates new investment mechanisms and offers insights for more effective participation in defined-contribution plans. And it monitors emerging retirement investment strategies.
In addition, the CWC has begun an investment product review. "Competitive returns should always be the first concern of trustees," says Graphics Communications Union vice president Paul Golden, a member of the AFL-CIO's new Investment Product Review Working Group. "Our goal is to see which products achieve their stated aims of job creation and encouraging worker-friendly business strategies." As in other forms of "socially responsible investing," there are screens; in this case, pro-worker screens. A worker-friendly corporate environment should comply with labor laws, invest in training and retraining, and respect the retirement security of working people.
Investment products currently under review fall into four fund categories: Real Estate, Public Equity and Debt, Private Capital and International (click here to see a list of the funds). While the review is geared toward institutional fund managers, some of the funds may be socially responsible ways to invest as individuals. Contact the CWC for more information:
Center for Working Capital
AFL-CIO
815 16th Street NW
Washington, D.C. 20006
Phone: (202)637-5179
Jeff Burman is an assistant editor representative
on the Guild's Board of Directors.
He can be reached via e-mail
Reprinted from
The Motion Picture Editors Guild Newsletter
Vol. 20, No. 4 - July/August1999
Guild Home | Newsletter Home | Top of Page
Copyright © 1999, All Rights Reserved by The Motion Picture Editors Guild, IATSE Local 700