The $4.2 billion in grants, to be disbursed over as long as a decade in some cases, represents less than 1 percent of the $525.6 billion in net income earned by the 50 companies in the most recent year, according to data from S&P Global Market Intelligence. Of that, companies reported just a tiny fraction - about $70 million - went to organizations focused specifically on criminal justice reform, the cause that sent millions into the streets protesting Floyd’s murder by a Minneapolis police officer. Meanwhile, $4.2 billion of the total pledged is in the form of outright grants. Two banks - JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America - accounted for nearly all of those commitments. Looking deeper, more than 90 percent of that amount - $45.2 billion - is allocated as loans or investments they could stand to profit from, more than half in the form of mortgages. To date, America’s 50 biggest public companies and their foundations collectively committed at least $49.5 billion since Floyd’s murder last May to addressing racial inequality - an amount that appears unequaled in sheer scale.
Where and how they dedicated their money became the most visible signs of their priorities. Now, more than a year after America’s leading businesses assured employees and consumers they would rise to the moment, a Washington Post analysis of unprecedented corporate commitments toward racial justice causes reveals the limits of their power to remedy structural problems.Īpple and AbbVie, Facebook and Pfizer, Johnson & Johnson and Procter & Gamble, and other top corporations made broad claims about what they would do, pledging to be a force for societal change and to fight racism and injustice, including violence against Black Americans. McDonald’s declared Floyd and other slain Black Americans “one of us.” After the murder of George Floyd ignited nationwide protests, corporate America acknowledged it could no longer stay silent and promised to take an active role in confronting systemic racism.įrom Silicon Valley to Wall Street, companies proclaimed “ Black lives matter.” JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon adopted the posture of former NFL quarterback Colin Kaepernick’s protests against police brutality and took a knee with bank employees.