Amazon decided to permanently keep the 70% of the 175,000 temporary employees they hired during the pandemic because of the unexpected demand their company is facing.
Ever since the US government leaders began issuing shelter-in-place mandates to minimize the spread of Covid-19 last March, the Amazon company was also spontaneously on a hiring spree.
According to the company’s blog site, it will offer full-time roles with minimum pay of $15 per hour and a “comprehensive benefits package” to the 125,000 temporary employees they hired due to the surge in business caused by Covid-19. Aside from that, those who will accept the offer become full-time workers starting June.
Amazon added:
“We hope the option for so many people to stay on long-term at Amazon will help alleviate some of the ongoing burdens of unemployment in communities across the U.S. as we all work together to fight through this crisis,”
The company’s hiring spree is currently the silver lining in the job market. The Department of Labor reported on Thursday that there were 2.1 million people filed initial jobless claims last week, leading for America to have 40 million unemployed citizens. It has been said that America has never recorded a single week with millions of jobless claims before the pandemic.
Since people were mandated to stay at home, most have been doing their shopping online, which benefited Amazon. It was clearly seen when the company’s stock price hit a high record last week. The sales performances alone increased Jeff Bezos’ wealth by $25 billion since January 1.
Aside from Amazon, Walmart (WMT), Target (CBDY), and Costco (COST) showed consumer gains during the pandemic. Although, the same can not be said for most other retail companies, which, due to closures of brick and mortar stores, has led to bankruptcies. One of them is the major chain Neiman Marcus and JCPenney (JCP).