(RepublicanInformer.com)- Amazon announced this week that it has increased its average starting wage in the United States to more than $18 an hour. Additionally, the company plans to hire another 125,000 warehouse and transportation workers.
In some locations, Amazon is also offering $3,000 signing bonuses for new employees – triple was the company was offering just four months ago.
Amazon boosted the minimum hourly wage to $15 back in 2018. A three dollar jump in as many years is a clear sign that, like many other US businesses, the workers’ shortage is forcing the company to increase enticements in order to lure workers off of unemployment and back to work.
Walmart recently increased its average hourly wage to $16.40, and Walgreens Boots Alliance recently announced that starting in October it would raise its minimum wage to $15.
Amazon also plans to include benefits like funding college tuition for workers and offering in some areas starting wages as high as $22.50 per hour.
Andy Jassy, Amazon’s new CEO after Jeff Bezos, told CNBC on Tuesday that it is time for a federal minimum wage increase in the United States. Easy for him to say. But not every company in the country is as rich as Amazon. Expecting a small business to match the kind of wages and benefits Amazon can afford to shell out is unrealistic to say the least.
This month Amazon looks to hire workers to help run one hundred new logistics facilities in the United States. This is on top of more than 250 facilities that opened earlier this year. Additionally, some new hires will aid in Amazon’s effort to introduce one-day delivery for Prime loyalty club members.
According to Amazon, the 125,000 warehouse workers are necessary just to help the company keep up with its growth. It hopes to fill these full-time and part-time jobs, as quickly as possible. However, Amazon didn’t offer a timeline for when the positions will be filled.
Amazon’s external delivery service partners are also looking to hire an addition 50,000 workers before the end of the year.
