public company
Gap Inc.
Industry Clothing
A public apparel retailer operating Gap, Old Navy, Banana Republic, and Athleta. Gap Inc. sells ordinary clothing at mass scale, but shareholder governance, global apparel labor risk, discount-cycle pressure, and textile waste keep it low.
Why this matters: Gap and Old Navy are common apparel choices, so they should be directly comparable to Levi’s, Uniqlo, Nike, and fast-fashion chains.
Letter grade D Extractive Medium confidence (AI) Rubric gcd-rubric-v1
* Tentative scaffolding score. Not human-checked or final.
Gap Inc. receives the Private Government badge because it combines large-scale private rule-setting over customers, workers, users, members, or counterparties with OpenLobby-documented lobbying of about $8.3M on public policy issues.
Evidence: [10]
The L badge appears when the Policy Capture penalty is severe. Here, L stands for Lobbying: the policy-capture value is -8, meaning the evidence indicates major private-interest lobbying or policy pressure against workers, customers, citizens, affected communities, democratic accountability, or ecological life.
Evidence: [9]
Request verification to have the evidence record checked against primary materials and organization-supplied documents. Verification does not buy a higher score; scores change only when review finds factual errors, omissions, or miscalibration.
Evaluation Overview
D - Extractive
The score turns mainly on Product Integrity, with the largest penalty coming from Policy Capture.
Strengths
- Product Integrity3/5
- Ownership2/10
- Governance2/10
Penalties
- Policy Capture-8
- Ecological Harm-3
- Surveillance Capture-2
- Toxic Products-1
Evidence state
- ConfidenceMedium confidence (AI)
- ThoroughnessDeveloped (AI)
- Linked claims10
- Direct axis claims9
- Coverage9/15
Scoring Axes
| Axis | Score | Why this score |
|---|---|---|
Ownership
?
Control rights: shareholder-dominated at 0, worker cooperative control
at 10.
|
2 / 10 |
Gap Inc. is controlled through conventional corporate ownership rather than worker, customer, or community governance. Linked evidence
|
Governance
?
Binding decision authority: centralized control at 0, democratic
stakeholder control at 10.
|
2 / 10 |
Gap Inc. sells apparel, footwear, accessories, or related consumer goods at large scale through stores, wholesale, and digital channels. Linked evidence
|
Extraction
?
Surplus allocation, wage share, CEO pay ratio, margins, and structured
extraction judgment.
|
2 / 10 |
Gap Inc. sells apparel, footwear, accessories, or related consumer goods at large scale through stores, wholesale, and digital channels. Linked evidence
|
Labor Sovereignty
?
Worker power: coercive conditions at 0, co-determination or ownership at
7. Employee dissatisfaction matters only when source-backed evidence
shows concrete limits on worker agency, such as coercive scheduling,
retaliation, wage theft, harassment, unsafe conditions, suppression of
worker voice, or extreme turnover.
|
1 / 7 |
Gap Inc. depends on global apparel or footwear supply chains where worker power is mostly mediated through supplier codes, audits, and compliance programs rather than worker control. Linked evidence
|
Solidarity with the
Unemployed
?
Treatment of exits and nonworkers, including severance, redeployment,
and non-competes.
|
1 / 7 |
Gap Inc. sells apparel, footwear, accessories, or related consumer goods at large scale through stores, wholesale, and digital channels. Linked evidence
|
Loss-Bearing Fidelity
?
Willingness to absorb costs to preserve values, workers, users, and
public obligations.
|
2 / 7 |
Gap Inc. sells apparel, footwear, accessories, or related consumer goods at large scale through stores, wholesale, and digital channels. Linked evidence
|
Market Conduct
?
Pricing fairness, switching costs, lock-in, and rent extraction.
|
2 / 5 |
Gap Inc. sells apparel, footwear, accessories, or related consumer goods at large scale through stores, wholesale, and digital channels. Linked evidence
|
Product Integrity
?
Preservation of quality rather than degradation for monetization.
|
3 / 5 |
Gap Inc. sells apparel, footwear, accessories, or related consumer goods at large scale through stores, wholesale, and digital channels. Linked evidence
|
Scale Integrity
?
Whether growth improves or degrades fairness and accountability.
|
1 / 5 |
Gap Inc. sells apparel, footwear, accessories, or related consumer goods at large scale through stores, wholesale, and digital channels. Linked evidence
|
Penalties
| Penalty | Applied | Why this penalty |
|---|---|---|
Ecological Harm
?
Footprint, trajectory, irreversibility, culpability, and scale,
including whether ecological harm is central to the model and continued
after credible notice. Range: -30 to 0.
|
-3 |
Gap Inc. retains conduct relevant to the Ecological Harm penalty: its clothing model creates material emissions, waste, packaging, production, logistics, or land-use burdens. Linked evidence
|
Policy Capture
?
Private-interest attempts to bend law, regulation, subsidies, taxes,
enforcement, trade, labor, safety, competition, environmental,
healthcare, housing, surveillance, civil-liberties, or consumer policy
against workers, customers, citizens, affected communities, or
ecological life. Public-interest advocacy is not penalized merely
because it is lobbying. Range: -15 to 0.
|
-8 |
OpenLobby records GAP INC. lobbying on environment, trade, labor, civil rights / civil law, budget, foreign policy, and other issues with about $8.3M in spending across 36 filings; the… Linked evidence
|
Toxic Products
?
Current sale of products whose ordinary use, exposure, ingredients,
residues, packaging, or formulation creates toxic, addictive, or
consumer-safety risk. Food products receive at least light scrutiny for
artificial colors, artificial flavors, petro-derived additives,
pesticide residues, contaminants, endocrine-disrupting packaging, and
ultra-processed formulation. Ordinary adult nightlife or alcohol service
is not penalized by itself without evidence of predatory marketing,
youth targeting, addiction-extractive design, or unusual product-safety
misconduct. Range: -5 to 0.
|
-1 |
Gap Inc. retains conduct relevant to the Toxic Products penalty: its product category includes materials, chemicals, additives, packaging, or ordinary-use harms that create toxic or safety risk. Linked evidence
|
Youth Capture
?
Manipulative youth-directed marketing, youth-data or attention
monetization, collectible/add-on traps, parasocial or identity capture,
surprise mechanics, or treating young people as lower-disclosure
consumers. Making useful toys or welcoming children is not itself
penalized. Range: -5 to 0.
|
-1 |
Gap Inc. retains conduct relevant to the Youth Capture penalty: youth culture, youth attention, children, teens, or young consumers are materially targeted or shaped by the brand or platform. Linked evidence
|
Surveillance Capture
?
Invasive surveillance, unreasonably non-optional tracking, facial
recognition, biometric identification, or AI behavior scanning of
customers, workers, bystanders, or the public. Range: -5 to 0.
|
-2 |
Gap Inc. retains conduct relevant to the Surveillance Capture penalty: customer, app, account, location, purchase, trip, or behavioral data materially increases institutional power over users. Linked evidence
|
Ideological Disavowal
?
Concealed ideology presented as neutrality, expertise, professional
necessity, public-service administration, market inevitability, or
non-ideological common sense while exercising power. Range: -3 to 0.
|
-1 |
Gap Inc. retains conduct relevant to the Ideological Disavowal penalty: it presents ordinary investor-centered, brand-managed market power as neutral consumer service rather than a contested institutional choice. Linked evidence
|
Bonus Credits
No bonus credits applied in this version.
Confidence Basis
Confidence Basis
Confidence is computed from the evidence trail and review state, not typed into the profile by hand.
Medium 75/100
9 verified linked claims 9 direct axis claims 0 disputed claims 9/15 components covered
This confidence label measures the source-backed evidence trail. AI-scaffolded scores remain tentative until human review.
Claim confidence 15/20
9 verified linked claims
Source quality 16/18
Best source per verified claim, weighted by institutional reliability
Direct axis-specific claims 9/18
9 direct claims across 15 active components
Dispute load 12/12
0 disputed claims on this entity
Recency 10/10
Newest accepted timestamp: May 13, 2026
Reviewer status 7/12
Human-reviewed components score higher than AI scaffolding
Component coverage 6/10
9/15 evidence-bearing components have direct support
Evidence State
Evidence State
Claims and Sources
Claims are the evidence record. Each claim needs a source link, axis category, status, confidence level, and timestamp before it can support a score.
* Tentative scaffolding score. Not human-checked or final.1Gap Inc. is controlled through conventional corporate ownership rather than worker, customer, or community governance.
- Gap Inc. annual reportsPrimary institutional record · 90%
- Gap Inc. ESG reportGeneral web source · 58%
- Gap privacy policyOfficial self-description · 68%
2Gap Inc. sells apparel, footwear, accessories, or related consumer goods at large scale through stores, wholesale, and digital channels.
- Gap Inc. annual reportsPrimary institutional record · 90%
- Gap Inc. ESG reportGeneral web source · 58%
- Gap privacy policyOfficial self-description · 68%
3Gap Inc. depends on global apparel or footwear supply chains where worker power is mostly mediated through supplier codes, audits, and compliance programs rather than worker control.
- Gap Inc. annual reportsPrimary institutional record · 90%
- Gap Inc. ESG reportGeneral web source · 58%
- Gap privacy policyOfficial self-description · 68%
4Gap Inc. retains conduct relevant to the Ideological Disavowal penalty: it presents ordinary investor-centered, brand-managed market power as neutral consumer service rather than a contested institutional choice.
- Gap Inc. annual reportsPrimary institutional record · 90%
- Gap Inc. ESG reportGeneral web source · 58%
- Gap privacy policyOfficial self-description · 68%
5Gap Inc. retains conduct relevant to the Ecological Harm penalty: its clothing model creates material emissions, waste, packaging, production, logistics, or land-use burdens.
- Gap Inc. annual reportsPrimary institutional record · 90%
- Gap Inc. ESG reportGeneral web source · 58%
- Gap privacy policyOfficial self-description · 68%
6Gap Inc. retains conduct relevant to the Toxic Products penalty: its product category includes materials, chemicals, additives, packaging, or ordinary-use harms that create toxic or safety risk.
- Gap Inc. annual reportsPrimary institutional record · 90%
- Gap Inc. ESG reportGeneral web source · 58%
- Gap privacy policyOfficial self-description · 68%
7Gap Inc. retains conduct relevant to the Surveillance Capture penalty: customer, app, account, location, purchase, trip, or behavioral data materially increases institutional power over users.
- Gap Inc. annual reportsPrimary institutional record · 90%
- Gap Inc. ESG reportGeneral web source · 58%
- Gap privacy policyOfficial self-description · 68%
8Gap Inc. retains conduct relevant to the Youth Capture penalty: youth culture, youth attention, children, teens, or young consumers are materially targeted or shaped by the brand or platform.
- Gap Inc. annual reportsPrimary institutional record · 90%
- Gap Inc. ESG reportGeneral web source · 58%
- Gap privacy policyOfficial self-description · 68%
9OpenLobby records GAP INC. lobbying on environment, trade, labor, civil rights / civil law, budget, foreign policy, and other issues with about $8.3M in spending across 36 filings; the reviewed filings document private institutional lobbying over public rules rather than a public-interest advocacy role.
- OpenLobby — GAP INC. lobbying profileGeneral web source · 58%
10Gap Inc. receives the Private Government badge because it combines large-scale private rule-setting over customers, workers, users, members, or counterparties with OpenLobby-documented lobbying of about $8.3M on public policy issues.
- OpenLobby — GAP INC. lobbying profileGeneral web source · 58%
Help Improve This Profile
Submit source-backed evidence or challenge a specific claim, source, axis value, or calculation below.
How This Page Is Maintained
Evidence comes in through contributors, is checked by verifiers, and is synthesized by reviewers. Founder authority remains narrow and visible; scores recalculate when verified claims or the rubric change.
Civic Note
Incorporation, limited liability, market access, and other institutional privileges are public grants. Good Companies Directory treats those privileges as conditional on accountability to workers, users, communities, and the public.
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Audit Log
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