Who is Providing the Most in Social Spending

MacKenzie Scott,  formerly married to Jeff Bezos, Amazon CEO, has donated $12.8 billion, or 20 percent of her net worth, to local communities.

Over the last couple of weeks, I have reported on social spending, evaluating healthcare organizations and insurance companies.  Both reports highlighted the limited contributions being provided to charity care per net income.  Today, I would like to focus on some major contributions in the private sector.  Known as Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), I am going to mention reported leaders in the key domains for SDoH:

• Economic Stability
• Education Access and Quality
• Health Care Access and Quality
• Neighborhood and Built Environment
• Social and Community Context

Although there are lots of companies doing their part, here is just a couple of examples

• To better support our growing issues with maternity death and complications, Netflix offers employees 52 weeks of paid parental leave to the birth parent and non-birth parent.

• Wells Fargo donates on average 1.5 percent of its revenue to charitable causes each year to more than 14,500 nonprofits (for comparison, in 2021 health insurance companies donated 0.67percent)
• TOMS’s originally was donating one pair of shoes for every pair purchased, however due to increasing complaints from other shoe companies for impacting the sales market, they have expanded donations to now cover people in need of prescription glasses, medical treatments, and ‘safe’ drinking water as well as building businesses in developing countries to create jobs.  Overall, TOMS’s donates one-third of all its profits to grassroots campaigns.

• Starbucks has initiated new efforts to support military personnel transitioning back into the community by prioritizing hiring of veterans, spouses, and contributing donations in military-based communities.

So far, Starbucks has impacted 440,000 individuals, and supported 25,000 military families in additional programs.  They are also working to increase their workforce and leadership presence for Black, Indigenous, and People of Color (BIPOC).

Finally shout out to MacKenzie Scott, for her social contributions since her divorce from Jeff Bezos, Amazon CEO in 2020.  Ms. Scott has donated $12.8 billion, 20 percent of her net worth, to local communities to improve such areas as youth programs, housing, and health outcomes ranging across 1,200 non-profit organizations nationwide. For reference to last week’s report, the top 20 health insurance companies have donated a combined $1.87 billion (2017-2021).  

Today I ask is your employer making contributions to support SDoH initiatives this year? 

• Yes
• No
• Unsure

The responses from Monitor Monday listeners may surprise you; they can be viewed here.

Programming Note: Listen to Tiffany Ferguson’s live reporting on the SDoH every Monday on Monitor Mondays at 10 a.m. EST.

References:

https://digitalmarketinginstitute.com/blog/corporate-16-brands-doing-corporate-social-responsibility-successfully

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s11606-022-07878-7#Tab1