New York (Trends Wide Business) – Amazon plans to hire 125,000 permanent warehouse and logistics workers in the United States ahead of the holiday shopping season, promising higher wages, new benefits and start-of-season bonuses for some of the jobs to attract staff in a tight job market.
Amazon said Tuesday that these jobs offer a median starting wage of more than $ 18 an hour, higher than its minimum wage of $ 15, and some of the roles include hiring bonuses of up to $ 3,000. Amazon said last week that it would begin offering to pay four-year college tuition for most of its workers, joining Walmart and Target in offering similar benefits.
Many retailers and logistics companies are struggling to find workers and have increased their pay and expanded benefits in response to staff shortages. In July, there were 879,000 job openings in the retail industry and 222,000 in the transportation and warehousing industry, according to the latest data from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics.
“It’s a very competitive job market. And certainly the biggest contributor to the inflationary pressures we’re seeing in the business,” Brian Olsavsky, Amazon’s chief financial officer, said in July. “We are spending a lot of money on hiring and incentives.”
The companies expect a strong demand in the end of the year holidays and in the hiring of personnel for the season. Retail sales this holiday season will increase as much as 9% from last year, while e-commerce sales will grow as much as 15%, Deloitte said in a forecast, published Tuesday.
Amazon and Walmart are hiring permanent employees before the holidays, while UPS, Kohl’s, Michaels and others are hiring temporary staff. Amazon hasn’t announced plans for temporary workers, but last year it added 100,000 temporary workers.
Amazon’s business has exploded during the pandemic as many shoppers, spending more time at home, increased their purchases online. The company has added more than 450,000 workers in the United States since the start of the pandemic and now has 950,000 American workers.
In another sign of its growth, Amazon said Tuesday that it will open more than 100 new facilities in September to pack and ship merchandise to customers, including regional air hubs for its growing fleet of cargo jets. Amazon has opened more than 250 facilities this year.
