Costco to increase hourly wage to $ 16 as minimum wage fights in Congress

Costco is increasing its starting hourly wage to $ 16, CEO Craig Jelinek said Thursday.

“Since the inception of Costco, the company has been committed to paying highly competitive retail salaries to its employees and providing them with extensive and affordable benefits,” Jelinek said at a Senate Budget Committee hearing. “Two years ago, we moved our starting hourly wage to $ 15 across the United States. Starting next week, the starting salary will increase to $ 16.

Jelinek said more than half of Costco’s U.S. employees earn more than $ 25 an hour.

Costco is the latest in a series of large retailers that have announced wage hikes in recent years due to state regulation and political pressure, but they have also done so to gain an advantage over their competitors. Before the coronavirus pandemic slowed the economy, unemployment rates were low – leading retailers to fight for scarce talent in a tight labor market. Over the past few years, Amazon, Walmart, and Target have gradually increased their starting wages to $ 15 an hour while providing workers with perks like tuition reimbursement programs.

Support increases in Congress for an increase in the federal minimum wage. A $ 15 salary is included in the $ 1.9 trillion Covid-19 relief bill currently on the table, which calls for a multi-year phased implementation of the increase by 2025. The President Joe Biden supports doubling the federal minimum wage by $ 7.25.

The problem has grown in popularity in recent months, as grocery store workers, restaurant workers and other front-line workers continue to bear a considerable share of the hardships of the pandemic. Democrats have used momentum as leverage to increase hourly pay, but bipartisan support for the measure has proven elusive. The senses. Mitt Romney, R-Utah, and Tom Cotton, R-Ark., On Tuesday announced a proposal that would raise hourly wages to just $ 10 by 2025.

Republican Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, DN.Y., a big advocate of the wage hike, denounced the Republican proposal in a tweet.

When members of Congress fight to set the minimum wage below a living wage, they play a role in creating and sustaining poverty in the United States.

The $ 15 / h proposal with implementation phased over several years is already a profound compromise.

$ 10 an hour is poverty imposed by law. https://t.co/uMlzZJt8yb

– Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) February 23, 2021

Senate Budget Committee Chairman Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., Has championed raising the minimum wage for years.

“Why should workers subsidize some of America’s richest families and largest corporations because of the starvation wages they pay their workers?” he said Thursday.

Leticia miranda contributed.