The Teamsters are asking for a hold on AmerisourceBergen CEO’s pay due to pending liability for the company’s involvement in opioids.

nvestors are exposed to those costs, the Teamsters say. And they argue that a bonus deferral program is a “critical” accountability measure that would give the company’s board a longer horizon to decide whether a bonus award is warranted in a given year. The proposal has also picked up support from two major advisory firms that make voting recommendations to investors: Institutional Shareholder Services (ISS) and Glass Lewis.

“The current incentive plans not only fail to hold management accountable for costly compliance failures but create potentially risky incentives to cut corners in the first place,” the Teamsters wrote in a letter to fellow shareholders last month, co-signed by Rhode Island’s state treasurer, and the UAW Retiree Medical Benefits Trust. The Teamsters’ pension and benefit funds own shares in the company.

All three groups are members of a broader coalition called Investors for Opioid and Pharmaceutical Accountability, which has advocated for increased board oversight at drug companies, distributors and pharmacies over the last two years. The coalition began pushing the bonus deferral concept in time for this year’s proxy season. Investors agreed either not to file, or to withdraw the proposal, at companies that agreed to participate in a working group on the issue.

via Teamsters take aim at executive bonuses at drug distributor AmerisourceBergen