new York
CNN
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Amazon is increasing the wages of its more than 800,000 warehouse and transportation workers in the US and providing them with Amazon Prime for free.
Amazon, one of the country’s largest private employers, announced Wednesday a wage increase of at least $1.50 an hour, bringing the company’s average starting wage above $22 an hour. Amazon will also offer its employees the $139 annual Prime perk for free.
Amazon’s decision to raise wages is another sign that the job market for logistics workers is tight, partly because more Americans are shopping online. The job market has cooled significantly over the past year, but the economy is still creating new jobs.
The average hourly wage for transportation and warehouse workers rose to $30.79 in August, up 22% from August 2020, according to the Labor Department. More than 460,000 jobs remained unfilled in the transportation and warehouse sector in July, the Labor Department said.
Competitors such as UPS, Walmart and Target have also raised wages for warehouse workers. UPS signed a five-year contract with the Teamsters union last year that included raising starting wages to $23 an hour for the duration of the contract.
Amazon’s pay increase comes ahead of the holiday season, which is usually the busiest time of year for online shopping. Sales are expected to rise by as much as 3.3 percent this holiday season, Deloitte predicted in a report last week. Online sales will grow by as much as 9 percent.
The safety and working conditions in Amazon’s warehouses have also been subjected to intensive scrutiny.
An investigation by the Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions found that Amazon’s warehouses are particularly dangerous for employees during the company’s annual Prime Day event, as well as during the holiday season. The company’s employees have repeatedly made headlines by complaining about the “grueling” experience of running through warehouses that are sometimes the size of 28 football fields while the company monitors their every move.
Amazon said Wednesday it has made progress in employee safety, with the company claiming workplace accidents have fallen 28 percent and serious injuries have fallen 75 percent over the past five years.
