Amazon to raise wages for more than 500,000 workers

Amazon said on Wednesday it would give a raise to more than 500,000 workers.

Amazon will raise wages by at least 50 cents to $ 3 an hour for more than half a million of its operations employees in the United States, said Darcie Henry, vice president of global human resources for Amazon, in a blog post on the company’s website. Amazon will spend more than $ 1 billion in additional compensation for these workers, Henry said.

The pay increases will begin to take effect from mid-May to early June of this year, Henry said. Amazon said it has increased the annual payroll review for positions within its customer processing, delivery, parcel sorting and specialized processing teams from fall to this spring.

The increases are intended to encourage hiring for tens of thousands of jobs in operations across the United States, Henry said. The jobs will add to the hundreds of thousands of workers Amazon created in 2020, as the coronavirus pandemic prompted the company to embark on a recruitment frenzy to deal with a surge in online orders.

As the economy has started to reopen, some companies say they have struggled to find workers and point to increased unemployment benefits as a possible reason for the staff shortage. Critics have argued that employers should consider raising wages to attract workers.

In 2018, Amazon increased its minimum wage to $ 15 an hour for all U.S. employees, following pressure from politicians and worker advocacy groups. The company threw its weight behind the Rise Wage Act, a bill backed by President Joe Biden and the Leading Democrats that would raise the federal minimum wage to $ 15 an hour from $ 7.25 an hour d ‘by 2025. Amazon also touted its starting salary of $ 15 an hour an hour as part of its argument against unionizing amid a high-stakes election in Alabama earlier this month.

The e-commerce giant is the country’s second-largest private employer in the United States, behind rival Walmart, with more than 800,000 employees nationwide.