Record Number of Businesses Earn Perfect Score on HRC’s Corporate Equality Index

The Human Rights Campaign Foundation has released the 21st edition of its Corporate Equality Index, a survey evaluating participating employers on how well they advocate for the LGBTQ community through employee benefits, workplace protections, inclusivity practices, and more. This year’s survey was more difficult and robust than in years past and still saw increases in LGBTQ inclusion from last year. Companies offering gender transition guidelines increased by over 60 percent and LGBTQ data collection almost doubled in company adoption. Since 2009, the number of companies offering trans-inclusive benefits increased from just 46 (7 percent of participants) to 1,298 (94 percdent of participants) in 2023.

This year, a record 545 businesses earned a perfect score of 100 points on the CEI, including 14 of the 36 participating Atlantabased companies: Alston & Bird; Coca-Cola; Cox Enterprises; Eversheds Sutherland; Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta; Fisher Phillips; Global Payments; IHG Hotels & Resorts; King & Spalding; Morris, Manning & Martin; Randstad; Southern Company; Truist Financial; and WestRock.

“Back in 2002, when this journey began, only 13 companies reached the top score,” HRC Foundation President Kelley Robinson said in a statement. “Today, we’re celebrating not just growth by a deepening commitment to true equality. This report is more than a set of scores. It’s a roadmap for ensuring that every LGBTQ individual has a fair chance to succeed in the workplace, backed by policies and practices that recognize their worth and dignity.”

To earn this top score, businesses must meet four criteria. They must include sexual orientation and gender identity in their workplace protections; they must offer inclusive benefits, including spousal and domestic partner benefits, inclusive family formation benefits, trans-inclusive health insurance, and an LGBTQ benefits guide; they must support an inclusive culture through LGBTQ internal education and training, LGBTQ data collection, transgender inclusion best practices, and LGBTQ employee resource groups; and they must uphold corporate social responsibility through LGBTQ outreach and engagement with their recruiting, marketing, philanthropy, and supplier diversity programs.

These findings come during a year that HRC has, for the first time in its 40-year history, declared a state of emergency for LGBTQ people. This year, more than 605 anti-LGBTQ bills were introduced in 41 states, with over 220 of them explicitly targeting the transgender community. Not only does this have a direct impact on the queer people subjected to these laws, but according to HRC’s 17th Annual LGBTQ Community Survey, nearly 80 percent of LGBTQ individuals reported that gender-affirming care bans made them feel less safe. “The ongoing State of Emergency for LGBTQ folks is a glaring reminder that our fight for equality and justice is far from over,” Robinson said. “We must continue to push, to advocate, and to demand policies and practices that ensure true equality for all … [This report] is a call to action. We must recommit ourselves to the fight for a world where every LGBTQ person can live freely, without fear, and with the full rights and recognition they deserve.”

To read the full report, visit reports.hrc.org/ corporate-equality-index-2023.