Kevin Stocklin

A new survey shows people prefer politically neutral brands s companies gear up for an economic downturn, cutting costs and staff, CEOs might want to heed the rising voices of consumers who want them to focus on business rather than politics.

According to a recent poll of more than 1,000 likely voters by the Trafalgar Group and Convention of States Action (COSA), nearly 80 percent said that, given the choice, they’d be more likely to buy from a company that was politically neutral. In a rare case of bipartisan consensus, Democrats (76.9 percent) and Republicans (78.8 percent) both felt this way in roughly equal measure.

COSA President Mark Meckler told The Epoch Times that the message to CEOs is “go back to doing what you were hired to do, which is to make money for shareholders.”

The term “woke” is used by both liberals and conservatives to describe a number of more radical progressive ideologies, including critical race theory, social justice, and gender theory.

Disney is a cautionary tale for CEOs, Meckler said. Disney has become a left-wing political advocate in recent years, introducing sexual content and a “not-at-all-secret-gayagenda” into children’s programs, promoting critical race theory and demanding reparations through shows such as “The Proud Family,” and fighting a parental rights law in Florida that bans sexual topics in public school for kids in third grade or younger.

This has been off-putting for some Disney customers, and the company’s share price has been hammered by shortfalls in subscribers to the Disney+ channel, claims of a hostile work environment by conservative staffers, and retaliatory actions by the state of Florida to revoke the privileged status of Disney’s theme park near Orlando.

“Capitalism, luckily for all of us, is a force of nature,” Meckler said. “You either make profits or you don’t, and ultimately companies that don’t make profits are going to be punished in the marketplace.”

In response to pressure from investors such as Nelson Pelz—who demanded that Disney improve its financial performance—the company fired CEO Bob Chapek, who initiated the fight with Florida, and has announced a corporate reorganization that will include laying off 7,000 employees and cutting more than $5 billion in costs.

Corporate cost-cutting will likely take a toll on corporate politicization, hitting HR departments and diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) executives who are becoming increasingly unaffordable.

A January report in Bloomberg stated that listings for DEI jobs were down 19 percent last year, a greater decline than in legal or HR depart- ments in general. This follows a dramatic expansion in DEI hiring after the Black Lives Matter protests in 2020. Adding to this are claims by laid-off diversity workers at Meta that they received eight weeks of severance pay, while most employees who were let go got 16 weeks. The diversity employees were part of Meta’s newly created Sourcer Development Program, which is designed to recruit minority employees.

Corporate executives may be seeing ideological pursuits as an increasingly unaffordable luxury. According to a 2022 survey by management consultancy KPMG, half of the CEOs polled stated that they were putting their ESG plans on hold because of the current business environment.

In addition to consumers, investors seem also to want companies to focus on business over politics. A 2022 survey by Consumers’ Research of 2,000 retail investors found that 70 percent of them said their primary goal is to save for retirement or generate income, versus 3 percent who invested for ESG goals such as fighting climate change or promoting social justice.

Despite this, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) moved in March 2022 to implement a new requirement that all listed companies must produce annual audited reports on the carbon emissions of their company and all suppliers and customers, as well as a plan to reduce them.

The SEC, established to protect small investors from securities fraud, claimed as justification that investors were demanding this information. However, the investors who support the SEC rule appear to be large institutional asset managers and progressive state pension fund managers rather than the people who depend on those investments to fund their retirement.