The Equitable Economy

Colleen Honigsberg and Robert J. Jackson, Jr. write that Exxon Mobil’s decision to sue its own investors over a shareholder proposal threatens to enervate an admittedly imperfect but ultimately valuable mechanism that provides shareholder feedback to corporate managers and helps both parties negotiate better governance outcomes.

On May 29, Exxon Mobil held its 2024 corporate election. Before the election, the company sued two investors over their proposal to include a commitment in its proxy statement to accelerate the company’s reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. Sarah Haan argues that the election and the lawsuit shed more light on current upheavals in corporate democracy than they do on the success of the ESG movement.

In new research, Jitendra Aswani finds that India’s mandatory corporate social responsibility contribution for large firms increased corporate borrowing costs, but transparency and clear communication to investors about these contributions reduced the additional costs.

Based on a new report from the Institute for Local Self-Reliance, John Farrell argues that the monopoly granted to private, investor-owned electric utilities by state governments is preventing the United States from accessing cheaper, cleaner, and more dependable electricity.

Matthias Breuer, Wei Cai, Anthony Le, and Felix Vetter find that gender minority representation on German works councils helps to improve worker welfare and productivity.

Diana Moss and Jason Gold write that the major private antitrust lawsuit involving how the National Collegiate Athletic Association governs compensation for college student athletes overreaches by remaking the model of college sports in the United States. Instead, the paradigm shift in college athletics should be deliberated and decided through the legislative process.

David Ennis evaluates how well the Affordable Care Act has met its expectations and where it has fallen short ten years after its implementation.

Eric A. Posner argues that merger review would benefit from involving union representatives to protect labor interests.

Gus Hurwitz replies to Jonathan Masur and Eric Posner’s May 8 article defending the Federal Trade Commission’s Congressional mandate to enforce a rule banning noncompetes. He argues that Congressional responses to FTC rulemaking in the 1970s suggest courts are unlikely to find that the FTC possesses such authority, either as a matter of statutory interpretation or under the major questions doctrine.

In new research, Sarah Schindler and Kellen Zale find that the vast majority of the most populous cities in the United States do not directly notify renters of land-use hearings. Such hearings provide a forum for local members of the public to voice opinions about how land should be used for housing and other construction and inform the decisions of policymakers. The failure to directly notify renters about these hearings can skew the decision-making process—and the housing market— toward homeowners and exacerbate anti-development tendencies in land-use law.