Vanguard’s bold, unique mission to champion the near-eradication of retirement fund fees is nothing short of world-changing. That’s according to Fortune Magazine, which ranked the Malvern-based asset management giant No. 22 among the top 50 companies that change the world.
The only Delaware Valley company on 2015’s first-ever Change the World list joins other big names that are making a big difference, like Nike, Cisco, MasterCard, SABMiller, Vodafone, Google and Facebook.
“For America’s middle class, many of retirement’s financial building blocks have crumbled,” Fortune explained in its profile of Vanguard. “Social Security and home equity look unreliable; pensions have nearly vanished. In their stead, 52 million savers rely on ‘self-directed’ pension plans like 401(k)s, where expenses can siphon away tens of thousands of dollars over a lifetime. No institution has done more to combat those costs than Vanguard, the champion of index investing.”
The inaugural list spotlights some of the most effective companies that are “doing well by doing good.”
“It’s really about how companies can help to solve social problems in ways that improve their bottom-line performance,” social change consulting firm FSG Founder and Managing Director Mark Kramer said in the Fortune video introducing the new list. “… There is not a tradeoff between doing good for society and running a successful business, but the two are interdependent. That combination is the magic to getting on this list.”
See the profiles of Vanguard and the other 49 finalists for the Fortune Change the World list here, and watch the video introducing the new rankings here.
