Investing: Stocks Socially conscious investors screen out stocks of alcohol and tobacco makers, fi rms with poor environmental records, and companies with poor labor practices. Some examples of “good,” socially conscious companies are Johnson and Johnson, Dell Computers, Bank of America, and Home Depot. The question is, are such stocks overpriced? One measure of value is the P/E, or price-to-earnings, ratio. High P/E ratios may indicate a stock is overpriced. For the S&P stock index of all major stocks, the mean P/E ratio is m 5 19.4. A random sample of 36 “socially conscious” stocks gave a P/E ratio sample mean of x 5 17.9, with sample standard deviation s 5 5.2 (Reference: Morningstar, a fi nancial analysis company in Chicago).

Does this indicate that the mean P/E ratio of all socially conscious stocks is different (either way) from the mean P/E ratio of the S&P stock index? Use a 5 0.05.