California Governor Jerry Brown has signed a bill into law which makes it mandatory for publicly traded companies headquartered in the state to have women on their board of directors. The companies are now required to have at least one woman on their boards by the end of next year and will then be required to have up to three by 2021 depending on how many directors in total are on the board.
“Given all the special privileges that corporations have enjoyed for so long, it’s high time corporate boards include the people who constitute more than half the ‘persons’ in America,” Brown said about the bill in a letter. He acknowledges that this law may have flaws that could be “fatal to its ultimate implementation.”
One such flaw is that the law states that companies will be governed by the state of their incorporation. Major tech companies like Apple, Alphabet, and Facebook all have principal executive offices in California but they are actually incorporated in Delaware.
Countless companies headquartered in California would be required to be in compliance with this law within the stipulated time if the law holds. The California Chamber of Commerce agrees with the bill’s intent but opposes how it proposes to implement the ultimate aim. Dozens of firms have also opposed this bill as well.
Filed in . Read more about California. Source: recode.net