William Simpson
Roughly half of Amazon’s frontline warehouse workers are having trouble paying their bills, a new report show. The study comes five years after the online retailer raised the minimum hourly wage to $15.
Fifty-three percent of workers said they had experienced food insecurity in the previous three months, while 48% said they had difficulty covering rent or housing costs during the same period, according to a report from the University’s Center for Urban Economic Development. of IllinoisChicago. Another 56% of warehouse workers who sort, pack and ship goods to customers said they were unable to pay their bills in full.
“This research indicates the extent to which goals have changed. In the past, large corporations leading the economy provided a path to the middle class and relative economic security,” Dr. Sanjay Pinto, senior researcher at CUED and co. -author of the report, said in a statement on Wednesday. “Our data indicates that about half of Amazon’s frontline warehouse workers are struggling with food and housing insecurity and making ends meet.
Despite working for one of the largest and most profitable companies in the U.S., Amazon warehouse workers appear to be so financially stretched that a third rely on at least one publicly funded assistance program, such as the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP. . The report’s data reveals what appears to be a gulf between what these workers earn and any measure of economic stability.
The researchers included survey responses from 1,484 workers in 42 states. The Ford Foundation, Oxfam America and the National Employment Law Project supported the work.
Linda Howard, an Amazon warehouse worker in Atlanta, said the pay for employees like her pales in comparison to the physical demands of the job.
“Hourly pay at Amazon is not enough for hard work… For the hard work we do and the money Amazon makes, every Associate should earn a living wage,” she said in a statement.
The report also highlights the financial destruction that can occur when warehouse workers take unpaid time off after becoming injured or tired from work.
Sixty-nine percent of Amazon warehouse workers say they have had to take time off to deal with work-related pain or exhaustion, and 60% of those who take unpaid time off for these reasons report experiencing food insecurity, according to the search.
“The findings we report are the first we know of to show an association between company health and safety issues and experiences of economic insecurity among its workforce,” said Dr. Beth Gutelius, director of research at CUED and co-author of the report. “Workers who have to take unpaid leave due to pain or exhaustion are much more likely to suffer from food and housing insecurity, and have difficulty paying their bills.”
An Amazon spokesperson did not immediately respond to CBS MoneyWatch’s request for comment on the report. In April, the company criticized previous research from groups that focused on workplace security and surveillance in Amazon warehouses.
“While we respect Oxfam and its mission, we have strong disagreements with the characterizations and conclusions made throughout this article – many based on flawed methodology and hyperbolic anecdotes,” Amazon said in part of the previous investigation. Amazon also cast doubt on the veracity of the responses used in the Oxfam report; the company said it believed researchers could not verify whether respondents actually worked for Amazon.
