House Financial Services Committee Chairwoman Maxine Waters (D – CA) created the Subcommittee on Diversity and Inclusion as one of her first acts in leadership this year focused on ethnic and gender equity issues across the financial industry.
This week, the Committee
held a hearing regarding the accessibility of diversity data titled “By the Numbers: How Diversity Data Can Measure Commitment to Diversity, Equity and Inclusion.” Among witnesses from both government and the private sector, the hearing included testimony from Thomas DiNapoli, New York State Comptroller, and Anne Simpson, Managing Investment Director, Sustainable Investments, CalPERS, arguing that diversity data is material information to shareholders and urging Congress and the SEC to mandate standardized disclosure, including disclosure of companies’ EEO-1 forms.
- Mr. DiNapoli argued that the SEC’s current principles-based disclosure “has led to DEI and board diversity data often being non-existent, inconsistent or, because of compatibility issues, unusable by investors.”
- Anne Simpson called voluntary disclosure “merry chaos” and touted disclosure principles by the Human Capital Management Coalition.
Congresswoman Rashida Tlaib (D – MI) highlighted the need for private equity firms to provide D&I data on their investments while Congresswoman Waters and Congresswoman Joyce Beatty (D-OH), Chair of the Subcommittee,
sent requests to the nation’s 31 largest investment firms for data on their diversity and inclusion. The requests included information on workforce/board diversity, spending with diverse suppliers (including the use of diverse asset management firms), and any challenges implementing D&I policies from 2016 through the present.
