Business Highlights
Roundup of top economy stories
NEW YORK — Amazon said Thursday it will pay the full college tuition for hourly workers starting next year, as competition to hire and retain workers gets fierce.
Other companies, including Walmart and Target, have recently started to pay for college or boost their existing programs. The job market is tight, and employers have been offering all kinds of incentives and perks to snag hourly workers, including raising pay and offering bonuses.
Amazon said more than 750,000 U.S. hourly workers are eligible, including those who pack and ship online orders at its warehouses. The program will launch in January.
The online shopping giant said the program employees are eligible 90 days after they’ve started work. Amazon said it’ll fund tuition, books and fees and hundreds of partnering schools, but didn’t name them.
DALLAS — The leading U.S. airlines say that the rise in COVID-19 cases is hurting ticket sales and pushing back the recovery of the travel industry. American, United, Delta, Southwest and others reported setbacks in regulatory filings Thursday. American says a slowdown that started in August has continued into September, and it’s lowering its outlook for third-quarter revenue. United says it now expects a pretax loss in the third quarter that could extend into the fourth quarter if the virus outbreak continues. Delta still expects to post an adjusted pretax profit for the third quarter, but revenue will be near the lower end of forecasts.
NEW YORK — Small businesses from Louisiana to Connecticut are facing an uncertain recovery after being walloped by Hurricane Ida and its residual rains and flooding last week. Days after the destruction, they’re reaching out to clients and staff, assessing damage and trying to plan for the way forward. But many say it’s difficult after a more than a year of the coronavirus and no visibility about how long supply chain issues, power outages or construction delays might last. “There’s no more anxious situation to a business owner than a complete lack of clarity in how to plan,” one business owner said.
McDonald’s will begin selling a vegan burger in the United Kingdom and Ireland this month. The McPlant burger, which was developed with Beyond Meat, features a plant-based patty on a vegan sesame bun with vegan cheese and vegan sauce. Both the patty and the cheese are made with pea protein. The McPlant will be cooked separately from other McDonald’s sandwiches. It will go on sale in 10 restaurants this month before being rolled out nationwide next year. McDonald’s has also tested the McPlant in Denmark, Sweden and Austria, but in those countries it uses regular cheese and sauce, so the burger isn’t vegan.
WASHINGTON — Average long-term mortgage rates were marginally higher this week as the recovering economy appeared stalled against the backdrop of a wave of new delta variant coronavirus cases. They remained under 3%.
Mortgage buyer Freddie Mac said Thursday that the average rate for a 30-year mortgage edged up to 2.88% from 2.87% last week. That’s very close to where the benchmark rate stood at this time last year, 2.86%. It peaked this year at 3.18% in April. Home loan rates fell in the early summer and then held despite increases in inflation.