In a Bloomberg Tax article, Joshua Lichtenstein, employment, executive compensation and employee benefits partner and head of the firm's ERISA fiduciary practice, discussed a new bill by Republicans in the House of Representatives in a continuing campaign against the U.S. Department of Labor rule on environmental, social and governance retirement investing after failing to override a veto of President Biden.
The House bill would amend the Employee Retirement Income Security Act of 1974 (ERISA) to mandate that retirement account managers consider only pecuniary factors when investing, and explicitly rule out ESG factors.
Josh explains that prohibiting a particular investment is not what ERISA was intended to do. He notes that doing so could burden regulators with the responsibility of trying to define ESG as a form of investment methodology or slate of specific market vehicles.
In another Bloomberg Law article, Joshua discussed how several Republican led states have adopted anti-ESG policies that break with long-standing ERISA-mirrored rules for public sector retirement plans.
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