Facing a tight labor market as the holiday shopping season approaches, many retail companies will undoubtedly consider following the lead of Amazon, which recently announced that it is raising its minimum hourly wage for all of its U.S. employees, including those working at Whole Foods stores, to $15 — $7.75 above the federal minimum wage.
Higher Wages Aren’t Enough to Turn Mediocre Jobs into Good Ones
What companies can do to improve their workers’ lives.
October 29, 2018
Summary.
Facing a tight labor market as the holiday shopping season approaches, many retail companies will undoubtedly consider following the lead of Amazon, which recently announced that it is raising its minimum hourly wage for all of its U.S. employees, including those working at Whole Foods stores, to $15 — $7.75 above the federal minimum wage. Higher wages are good for retail and other low-wage service workers. They are also necessary for many companies that are stuck in a vicious cycle of bad jobs, bad operations, bad customer service, low productivity, and high costs. But higher wages alone are not enough to break this vicious cycle. They must be accompanied by other changes — a whole new operating system.