Amazon said Thursday it will pay full college tuition for its 750,000 employees per hour in the U.S., expanding its educational benefit at a time when employers are struggling to hire workers in a shrinking job market. The retailer said it will fund full college tuition for workers who have been with the company for more than 90 days.
The company said the offer means all 400,000 workers it has hired since the start of the pandemic could benefit from the benefit when it goes into effect in January. The new education program will also pay for high school degrees, GEDs and English as a Second Language (ESL) proficiency certifications, the company said.
While Amazon has been driven by demand for online shopping during the pandemic and has grown rapidly to become the country’s second-largest private employer, it also fought complaints about workers ’conditions, such as a lawsuit filed by New York State alleging that the company he could not protect the workers of COVID-19. Some workers have also claimed that warehouse conditions are driven by demanding quotas and algorithms that do so. it’s hard to find time to use a toilet, an issue that is now being addressed by California lawmakers who want to put limits on warehouse production quotas.
At the same time, the wages of low-paid workers are rising across the country as employers struggle to recruit in the midst of a labor shortage due to the pandemic. Although some companies have blamed pandemic unemployment benefits (which ended on Labor Day), the nation’s workforce still it has not regained its pre-pandemic size. Today about 161.5 million people work, compared to 164.5 million before COVID closed the economy.
Previously, the e-commerce giant offered educational benefits, but they were only available to workers who had been in the company for a year. He had also paid 95% of the costs, but had a $ 3,000 limit for each full-time employee, according to the Century Foundation, which is on the left.
Amazon said Thursday it will pay tuition and employee fees in advance instead of reimbursing them once courses are completed, which it said would help employees who otherwise would not have the money to enter an educational program. .
Amazon’s new program follows similar moves from rival retailers, including Walmart, the country’s largest private entrepreneur, and Target. Last month, Target said it would offer its 340,000 American employees the chance to go to college for free, while a larger business rival Walmart has done the same agreement for its 1.5 million workers.