Sens. Warner, Brown advocate SEC updates on human capital disclosure

U.S. Sens. Mark R. Warner (D-VA) and Sherrod Brown (D-OH) recently forwarded correspondence to U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) Chairman Gary Gensler as a means of encouraging human capital disclosure updates.

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Warner, a member of the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs, and Brown, chairman of the committee, are calling on the SEC to require companies to report the number of workers they employ who are not classified as full-time employees, including independent and subcontracted workers.

“We believe that the disclosure of this data is critical to fully capture companies’ human capital management,” the senators wrote. “We applaud the SEC for focusing on strengthening human capital disclosures as part of its regulatory agenda.”

Warner and Brown said that investors need more information to understand how companies treat people, noting the element serves as a company’s most critical asset.

“We agree that investors need disclosures that include quantifiable and comparable datasets that clearly articulate a company’s human capital management, such as metrics on turnover, skills and development training, compensation, benefits, workforce demographic and health and safety,” Warner and Brown concluded. “That picture would be wholly incomplete, however, if companies are not required to disclose information about the number of independent contractors they use on a regular basis and the entire workforce that is material to their business strategy.”

The lawmakers indicated subcontracted workers considered part of the material workforce include security personnel, janitors, food service workers, housekeepers for hotels, and lodging real estate investment trusts (REIT).