KOHL'S CORPORATION | Living Wage Disclosure at KOHL'S CORPORATION

Status
Withdrawn
AGM date
Previous AGM date
Resolution details
Company ticker
KSS
Lead filer
Sisters of St. Francis of Philadelphia
Resolution ask
Report on or disclose
ESG theme
  • Social
ESG sub-theme
  • Decent work
Type of vote
Shareholder proposal
Filer type
Shareholder
Company sector
Consumer Discretionary
Company HQ country
United States
Resolved clause
"RESOLVED, that shareholders of Kohl’s Corporation (“Kohl’s” or the “Company”) urge Kohl’s board to oversee the preparation of a Living Wage Report in order to give investors information they need to assess the extent to which Kohl’s is complying with international human rights standards and helping to mitigate systemic risks stemming from income inequality. The Living Wage

Report should be updated semiannually and disclosed on Kohl’s website and should include:
The number of Kohl’s workers paid less than a living wage, broken down by full-time employees, part-time employees, and contingent workers; By how much the aggregate compensation paid to workers in each category falls short of the aggregate amount they would be paid if they received a living wage; and The living wage benchmark/methodology used for these disclosures

A living wage is defined as a level of compensation that is “sufficient to afford a decent standard of living for the worker and her or his family” in their location, including “food, water, housing, education, health care, transportation, clothing, and other essential needs including provision for unexpected events.”[1] Contingent workers are workers employed by staffing entities with which Kohl’s contracts as well as seasonal workers employed directly by Kohl’s."
Supporting statement
"SUPPORTING STATEMENT
The right to a living wage is recognized in international human rights norms. The Universal Declaration of Human Rights provides that “[e]veryone who works has the right to just and favourable remuneration ensuring for himself and his family an existence worthy of human dignity.”[2] The Preamble to the International Labor Organization’s Constitution cites “the provision of an adequate living wage” as key to improving conditions of labor that impose “injustice, hardship and privation.”[3]
High levels of income inequality are a systemic risk for investors. According to The Investment Integration Project, “income inequality slows economic growth, limits upward mobility, and exacerbates political polarization—threatening investments in all asset classes.”[4] As of 2017, aggregate household, government and business spending had been depressed by two to four percentage points of GDP annually as a result of rising inequality.[5] In the US, between 1979 and 2019, the top 1% of earners saw their wages grow six times faster than wages paid to the bottom 90%,[6] and the ratio between CEO and median worker pay has grown from 20 in 1950 to 344 among the top 350 companies in 2022, using the realized pay methodology.[7]
Data collected through social media in 2021 indicated that 78% of Kohl’s employees are paid less than $15.00 an hour.[8] Kohl’s itself does not disclose any information about the extent to which its workforce is paid a living wage or the gap between Company wages and a living wage, which would allow shareholders to assess the Company’s contribution to the systemic risk created by income inequality as well as its compliance with international human rights norms. This Proposal does not require Kohl’s to use a particular living wage calculator or methodology in making the requested disclosure.
[1] https://www.globallivingwage.org/about/what-is-a-living-wage/
[2] https://www.ohchr.org/en/human-rights/universal-declaration/translations/english, Article 23.
[3] https://www.ilo.org/dyn/normlex/en/f?p=NORMLEXPUB:55:0::NO::P55_TYPE,P55_LANG,P55_DOCUMENT,P55_NODE:KEY,en,ILOC,/Document
[4] https://tiiproject.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/TIIP-Stewardship-Final.pdf, at 2.
[5] https://tiiproject.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/TIIP-Stewardship-Final.pdf, at 17.
[6] https://tiiproject.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/TIIP-Stewardship-Final.pdf, at 3.
[7] https://www.epi.org/publication/ceo-pay-in-2022/
[8] https://shift.hks.harvard.edu/the-company-wage-tracker/"

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