If you don’t have shareholder voting privileges, you are not meaningfully in control of anything in the situation. OP said:
Many of us through our 401k are the shareholders demanding returns.
But if you’re invested in a 401(k) you’re not a shareholder, and you’re not demanding returns at a shareholder vote as part of actual company governance. You are not owed specific fiduciary duties by the officers of the companies in question because you are not a shareholder. You’re just a person who invested in a 401(k). These words have hard and fast meanings.
So do you have shareholder voting privileges?
Does it matter? If you’ve invested in something do you not want “line goes up”?
If you don’t have shareholder voting privileges, you are not meaningfully in control of anything in the situation. OP said:
But if you’re invested in a 401(k) you’re not a shareholder, and you’re not demanding returns at a shareholder vote as part of actual company governance. You are not owed specific fiduciary duties by the officers of the companies in question because you are not a shareholder. You’re just a person who invested in a 401(k). These words have hard and fast meanings.