Apple Magazine - USA - Issue 408 (2019-08-23)

(Antfer) #1

meaningful but said it was unclear whether it
would have much impact.
It’s easier for companies to quantify success
through shareholder value, or stock prices, Lin
noted, than to document an adherence to other
values. If the CEOs who signed the statement
pledged something more specific at their
companies, it could be more constructive, he said.
“For example, Jamie Dimon can remove all
the forced arbitration clauses to serve the
customers, raise tellers’ wages or lower fees on
their products,” Lin wrote in an email. “I will be
surprised if companies do start to act differently.”
“Talk is cheap,” added Adam Seth Litwin,
associate professor of industrial and labor
relations at Cornell University’s School of
Industrial and Labor Relations. “The question
is, how will these CEOs actually respond when
the chips are down and shareholders really
start making their usual demands for sky-high
quarterly returns?”
In the meantime, many American workers have
said they don’t feel much like beneficiaries of
what is now the longest expansion on record
because the kinds of jobs they once enjoyed —
permanent positions, with stability, bonuses,
pensions, benefits and opportunities to move
up — are now rarer.

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