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Originally Posted by Frank MetaMusil
I'm not sure what you mean here. Nike had to fix their sweatshop image after their stock plummeted. Investors clearly didn't stand for unethical treatment in that case.
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I’d argue the consumer market boycotts were a much bigger factor than the shareholders in this example. What would the shareholders have used to persuade Nike? “Stop this or we’ll sell our shares which have plummeted?”
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Do you have any examples of this behavior?
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There are a number of companies that people continue to invest in despite their history of questionable business practices. This isnt to suggest that no investors care or that investors throw all ethics out the window, but there is evidence to suggest that overall it is not a major concern among many investors.
To answer your question, it would really depend on what you consider to be poor treatment or a lack of ethics. For myself, some examples would be Nike(as you mentioned), Walmart, McDonald’s etc... As well as companies that eliminate jobs through mergers. The grocery and retail industries in general is a great example of profits over ethics. When sobey’s bought Safeway Canada, there were job losses, but people continue to invest in those companies. Same thing with the Loblaws acquisition of shoppers, but the shareholders approved of it because it made their shares more valuable. What message did the shareholders send in response to the joe fresh factory collapse in Bangladesh? Their stocks didn’t plummet, and I don’t recall hearing of there being a rush of investors selling their stocks in Loblaws.
https://www.google.ca/amp/business.f...pse-loblaw/amp
This article on the joe fresh factory tragedy demonstrates how despite a long history of unethical business practices, publicly traded companies have opted to for the most part maintain their current practices while they internally “fix” the issue. It also speaks of Walmart shareholders voting 50-1 against implementing policies aimed at improving workplace safety in their foreign facilities after a fire in a garment factory.