Give a boost to the US labor market! Amazon will hire 250,000 seasonal workers, surpassing pre-pandemic levels, and even offering salary increases!

As the approaching of the North American traditional consumer peak season - the holiday shopping season related to Thanksgiving and Christmas, Amazon, the world's largest e-commerce company, announced on Tuesday, September 19th, that it will hire 250,000 employees during this holiday shopping season and raise the average wage of logistics personnel from $19 per hour to around $20.5 per hour to cope with the labor shortage.

In a blog post on Tuesday, the company stated that the recruited employees will include full-time, part-time, and seasonal workers, with hourly wages ranging from $17 to $28 depending on the location. Some new employees will be eligible for signing bonuses ranging from $1,000 to $3,000.

Amazon typically increases hiring in the fall to ensure sufficient staff for the holiday shopping season, and it first announces wage increases and staffing plans. Last year, Amazon announced plans to hire 150,000 employees. In 2019, the company pledged to hire 200,000 seasonal workers. This means that Amazon's recruitment scale for this year's holiday shopping season has exceeded the level before the COVID-19 pandemic.

Amazon is the second-largest private employer in the United States, second only to Walmart. As of the end of June this year, the company employed 1.46 million employees worldwide. Most of these people work in the company's vast logistics department, mainly in warehouses where items are stored and packaged.

In recent years, as labor tensions have intensified, Amazon has gradually increased the average starting salary for frontline employees. Warehouse and delivery workers have taken measures to organize and confront management in multiple facilities, while legislators and labor groups have criticized the frequent injuries that occur among warehouse workers, among other issues.

In the face of resurging inflation, especially the sharp rise in gasoline prices, some market analysts are concerned that Amazon's wage increase for workers may further exacerbate inflation.

The year-on-year increase in the US Consumer Price Index (CPI) in August rebounded from 3.2% in July to 3.7%, marking the second consecutive month of year-on-year growth and surpassing the expected 3.6%. The month-on-month growth rate of CPI in August also accelerated from 0.2% in July to 0.6%, in line with expectations, marking the largest month-on-month increase in 14 months. Among them, gasoline prices rose by 10.5% month-on-month, becoming an important driver.

Although inflation in the United States is rising, statistics show that the prices of online goods in August decreased by 3.2% year-on-year, marking the 12th consecutive month of decline and the largest decrease since April 2020. In terms of categories, prices of computers, electronic products, and household appliances have the largest year-on-year declines, with some subcategories even experiencing double-digit declines. However, prices of daily groceries have rebounded. However, online shopping only accounts for approximately 15% of US consumption.