Amazon earned praise for making the move to raise the minimum wage for its hourly workers to USD$15 dollars this week, but it is soon realized that the decision came at the expense of some other perks getting nullified, such as monthly bonuses and stock grants.
In an email sent to CNBC, the trillion-dollar worth company confirmed that it will be getting rid of the aforementioned incentives to make way for the hourly wage increase. Amazon, however, emphasized the fact that the new rate should be more than enough to compensate for the lost company benefits.
Moreover, the e-commerce giant added that the all its hourly Operations and Customer Service employees would be able to see an immediate and predictable growth of their income as compared to the previous incentive-based compensation.
Regardless, Amazon is open to hearing any concerns from those workers who will be affected by this new pay scheme, the statement quoted over the news outlet indicated.
Issues of Lesser Compensation
On Wednesday, a number of Amazon employees reportedly said that they might be making less money because of this recent pay structure.
According to Bloomberg, workers for Amazon in the US would receive a total of hundreds of dollars per month just for monthly bonuses. Citing unnamed sources claiming direct knowledge of the issue, employees were also eligible to get one Amazon share, which is now worth USD$1,959, at the end of every year. On top of that, another single company share will be rewarded for every five years.
As further stipulated over at Yahoo News, the previous scheme would have warehouse workers earning as much as 8 percent of their base monthly income, that is roughly around USD$3,000 a year.
With those benefits already out of the way, some rank-and-file members of the organization are now wary that they might never get to earn that much money as they once did before.
Amidst Criticisms
The announcement from Amazon indicating that it would no longer give stock incentives and bonuses for its workers came after it was bombarded with criticisms for the apparent low wages coupled with the poor working conditions at its warehouses around the country.
In light of its recent move, Amazon received plaudits from two of its most ardent critics, Sen. Bernie Sanders and the US President Donald Trump.
Larry Kudlow, the White House spokesperson, lauded this new development saying that he is in favor of higher minimum wages. Sanders, for his part, said that credit is due for Amazon for doing what's necessary, a separate report from CNBC stated.
