The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Target is raising minimum wage to $15 by end of 2020
Retailer’s move could force some rivals to match the initiative.
NEW YORK — Target Corp. is raising its minimum hourly wage for workers to $11 starting next month and then to $15 by the end of 2020, a move it says will help it hire and keep the best employees and make shopping a better experience for customers.
The initiative announced Monday is part of the discounter’s overall strategy to improve its business, which includes remodeling stores, expanding its online services and opening up smaller urban locations.
Target quietly raised entry-level hourly wages to $10 last year from $9 from the previous year, following initiatives by Walmart and others to hike pay in a competitive marketplace.
But Target’s increase to $15 per hour far exceeds not only the federal minimum of $7.25 but the hourly base pay at Walmart, the nation’s largest private employer, and plenty of its retail peers whose minimum hourly pay hovers around $10. Now Target’s raise could force some rivals to match the pay.
“We see this not only as an investment in our team but an investment in an elevated experience for our guests and the communities we serve,” CEO Brian Cornell said.
Thousands of workers nationwide have protested to call attention to their financial struggles and to fight for $15 an hour. The election of a Republican-controlled Congress dampened hopes of an increase in the federal minimum wage, but advocates have continued to press at the state and local level.
At the same time, competition for lower-skilled workers has heated up. As shoppers get more mobilesavvy, retailers want staffers who are more skilled at customer service and in technology such as using iPads to check out inventory. But with the unemployment rate near a 16-year low, the most desirable retail workers feel more confident in hopping from job to job.
Some 75 percent of hourly retail workers now change jobs within a year, compared with 50 percent during the Great Recession, according to Korn Ferry Hay Group, a global consultancy group.
Thirty-two percent of all first jobs in the U.S. are in retail, according to the trade group the National Retail Federation, and stores overall have more job openings now than they did a few years ago.
Hourly pay at restaurants and hotels is up 3.5 percent from a year earlier, a much better raise than the 2.5 percent gain for all employees. For workers at transportation and warehousing companies, where e-commerce growth is fueling hiring, pay is up 2.7 percent in the past year.