*TIAA-CREF and Socially Responsible Investment*
23 March 2008
*In the coming weeks/months, TIAA-CREF (TC) will announce a new type of investment that we have long sought!!* We now have good dialogue with TC’s Social and Community Investment Department and they have been very open to investigating our suggestions. We’ll soon propose to them a new, truly “transformative” venture (what that department says they seek). It would, literally, save hundreds of thousands of lives over a long term; a whole new level of social change far exceeding the beneficial social good that TC social ventures have thus far brought. More to follow on all that later.
For now, we must lobby TC to do the “shareholder activism” we have also long sought. And now is a critical time, for TC is now making decisions about voting its shares and engaging companies for the spring/summer season of annual company meetings. We also just received word from TC saying they are currently examining our issues. SO, please call and write TC now, focusing on a specific theme we feel is best to pursue at this time (not forgetting other interests). That is asking TC to adopt a labor rights emphasis in their attempts to influence their portfolio companies, focusing on Coca-Cola, Nike, and Wal-Mart. See details below. *CALL AND EMAIL TIAA-CREF TODAY; SEND THIS MESSAGE TO LIKE-MINDED COLLEAGUES AT HOME AND NATION-WIDE, BE THEY IN TIAA-CREF OR NOT. THANK YOU.*
Neil Wollman; Ph. D.; Senior Fellow, Bentley Alliance for Ethics and Social Responsibility; Bentley College; Waltham, MA, 02452; NWollman@Bentley.edu ; 260-568-0116
*AFT/NYSUT PASS RESOLUTIONS REGARDING TIAA-CREF AND LABOR RIGHTS.*
*WHETHER YOU ARE INVESTED IN TIAA-CREF OR NOT, READ HOW YOU CAN *
*HELP PROMOTE CORPORATE RESPONSIBILITY*
Dear Friends,
It's morning in America---do you know where your 401K or pension fund assets were last night?
Would it upset you to know that TIAA-CREF---the nation's largest retirement fund, with over $400 billion and three million participants---is a major investor in Wal-Mart, Nike, and Coca-Cola. Millions of TIAA-CREF investors are contributing their money to support these companies and their abusive human and labor rights practices. Yet TIAA-CREF says it provides financial services "for the greater good."
In 2007, the 600,000 member New York State United Teachers (NYSUT) and 1.4 million member American Federation of Teachers (AFT) passed resolutions critical of TIAA-CREF's continued investment in these companies (see below). Educators and those working along-side them have spent careers* *trying to help students learn the truth about the world around them. The* *truth is that TIAA-CREF continues to invest funds in these corporate bad* *actors.
It's time for faculty, staff, organizations, and citizens across America to tell TIAA-CREF that it must use its considerable shareholder power to influence Wal-Mart, Nike, and Coke for the better--or stop investing in them.
We’ve influenced TIAA-CREF on issues of social responsibility in the past and can do so again with your help. *What can you do? Here are three actions you can take:*
*1)* Turn up the heat on TIAA-CREF to truly invest for the "greater good." Help us educate faculty/staff/organizations you know--and nationwide (distribute this message widely). Whether you have money invested in a TIAA-CREF account or not----email a personal version of the below message to CEO Herbert Allison at Hallison@tiaa-cref.org , and send a copy to: trustees@tiaa-cref.org . Also leave the same message In a phone call (800-842-2733 or 212-490-9000 and ask for CEO Herb Allison).
*/"I am concerned about TIAA-CREF being a major investor in Wal-Mart, Nike,,/**/ and Coca-Cola, companies involved in abusive human and labor rights practices. I want TIAA-CREF to put these corporations on notice that if they don't clean up their bad practices, that TIAA-CREF will find other companies to invest in. TIAA-CREF needs to engage these companies, as a lead-in toward adding labor rights as an emphasis of their shareholder activism, as a complement to their already chosen area of human rights abuses in Sudan.” /*
*/Let Mr./**/ Allison know if you are in the TIAA-CREF system; and if you are able to do so at your institution and feel strongly enough, say that you (or your whole school/organization) will withdraw money from TIAA-CREF if it doesn't engage or withdraw from these companies./*
*2)* As a faculty/ staff/organization, send a letter to TIAA-CREF and/or pass a resolution concerning the companies and send it to: Herbert Allison, CEO, TIAA-CREF, 730 Third Avenue, New York, NY 10017.
*3)* Write a letter to the editor of your school, local, or a national newspaper on these concerns.
Yours,
The Make TIAA-CREF Ethical Coalition (www.makeTIAA-CREFethical.org )
*Below Is the NYSUT resolution; the AFT one was very similar*
*Urging TIAA-CREF to Continue Developing Shareholder Activism In Support Of Labor Rights In the United States and Abroad*
*Submitted by: *Professional Staff Congress/CUNY
Whereas, NYSUT has been historically committed to the defense of human, civil and labor rights as well as the promotion of social justice both at home and abroad; and
Whereas, NYSUT members in higher education generally have the option of selecting TIAA-CREF as their retirement plan, and the decision, made within the first month of full-time employment, is irrevocable; and
Whereas, NYSUT has continuously demonstrated its opposition to low-wage, non-unionized labor; and
Whereas, NYSUT has consistently informed its members and the public at-large regarding the unfair labor practices of many corporations currently included in TIAA-CREF’s stock portfolio (e.g. Wal-Mart, Coca-Cola, Nike and others) and whose Third World suppliers routinely ignore workers’ rights to organize and collectively bargain; and
Whereas, a significant number of NYSUT’s members in higher education have their pensions invested in TIAA-CREF; and
Whereas, NYSUT members are also investors and pensioners with social commitments that come with financial involvements; and
Whereas, TIAA-CREF prides itself on being sensitive to the concerns which investors express about socially responsible investment policies; and claims to endorse and engage in corporate accountability; and
Whereas, TIAA-CREF’s Social Choice Account, though a more responsible investment alternative because it excludes companies that derive their revenue from alcohol, tobacco, firearms, gambling, military weaponry and electric utilities that own interests in nuclear power plants, does not exclude corporations that insufficiently promote labor rights both at home and abroad; and
Whereas, these socially responsible retirement investment options include many financially successful funds; therefore be it
Resolved, that NYSUT recognizes that its members who participate in TIAA-CREF should be offered the option of socially conscious investments that include options that screen for companies’ labor policies as well as other social criteria; and
Resolved, that NYSUT on behalf of its membership encourages TIAA-CREF’s directors and trustees to substantially strengthen their corporate oversight of companies in which it invests; and be it further,
Resolved, that NYSUT encourages TIAA-CREF’s new office of Social and Community Investing to refine its Social Choice Account so that it contains an explicit, clearly monitored and widely publicized labor rights screen that rules out the inclusion of companies, both in the United States and abroad, that conduct anti-union intimidation campaigns, refuse to bargain collectively, do not pay a living wage and don’t offer minimal health and retirement benefits; and be it further
Resolved, that NYSUT encourage TIAA-CREF’s office of Social and Community Investing to offer new options that include companies with strong records in workers’ rights, community development and environmental issues; and be it further
Resolved, that NYSUT communicate its interest in a socially conscious investment policy that includes labor screening to the TIAA-CREF President and Chief Executive Officer, the Vice-President and Chief Investment Officer, the Head of Corporate Governance, the Director and Managing Director of Social and Community Investing and the Board of Trustees and ask for a response within three months of this NYSUT RA convention.
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