Technology and e-commerce giant Amazon Inc (NASDAQ:AMZN) has announced plans to hire 125,000 people to fill vacancies in the logistics and transportation departments. In a statement, the company further informed it would pay the new workforce an average salary of $18 per hour.
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Better Pay
According to the release, these jobs are added to the 40,000 openings Amazon opened last week to fill its demand for corporate and tech workers.
The hourly wage for jobs now on offer reaches $22.5 in some cities. Further, the company will provide part-time employees with health, dental, and vision insurance, as well as 20 weeks of parental leave.
“The world's largest online retailer has raised pay from an average of around $17 since May,” to $18 per hour, as reported by KSL.
In some cities, Amazon even plans to pay new employees a bonus just for signing the contract of $3,000.
"We are proud of the opportunities we offer to people of all backgrounds, from laid-off employees to former military personnel. We take our responsibility as an employer very seriously and want our employees to succeed and prosper,” Dave Clark, CEO of Global Consumer Affairs, said.
Luring Employees
Amazon has become the second-biggest U.S. private employer, and it is working hard to lure new workforce into the ranks. Dave Bozeman, vice president of Amazon Delivery Services said, “It's a tight labor market, and we've seen some of that as the entire industry is seeing.”
According to reports, the company’s external delivery service partners are also working hard to hire a further 50,000 employees by the end of this year.
The move is also seen as a way to encourage potential staff amid a significant shortage of workers, with the holiday season fast approaching. Retailers are hence offering additional benefits such as education incentives, better wages, and sign-on bonuses.
Amazon’s announcement came one week after it had disclosed a program to cover 100% of college tuition for 750,000 employees.
The company said at the time: “At Amazon, we know that investing in free skills training for our teams of workers can have a huge impact for hundreds of thousands of families across the country.”
Amazon is part of the Entrepreneur Index, which tracks 60 of the largest publicly traded companies managed by their founders or their founders’ families.
