Job and Family Services Ohio Food Stamp Balance
Jeff Bezos, founder and chief executive officer of online retailing behemothic Amazon.com, became the earth'south richest person in October 2017, according to Forbes magazine. And in January 2018, Bezos' company opened the outset "Amazon Go" — a new kind of store with no checkout required — in Seattle, Washington, to considerable fanfare:
Amidst a wave of increased printing coverage and scrutiny, a viral meme made a number number of claims about Amazon in January 2018:
A spokesperson for Amazon confirmed the fact that the visitor'southward new grocery store, Amazon Go, does not accept SNAP benefits or food stamps every bit a grade of payment.
The source of the claim about Amazon workers receiving food stamps was a January 2018 report by the nonprofit grouping PolicyMatters Ohio, which estimated that roughly 700 Amazon workers in Ohio (more than than 10 percent of the company'due south employees in the land) receive Supplementary Nutrition Assist Program benefits:
Every bit of concluding Baronial, 1,430 Amazon employees or family members were getting assist under the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Plan (SNAP), according to the Ohio Department of Job & Family Services.
In August, the average Ohio family unit receiving SNAP independent only more than two people. Based on that average, more than than 700 Amazon workers received benefits that calendar month, or more than than one in every 10 of those Ohioans employed by the company.
PolicyMatters Ohio arrived at that estimate by finding the number of Ohio food stamp recipients who are part of a household where someone works for Amazon (1,430), then dividing that by two.02 (the boilerplate size of a household on food stamps in Ohio at that time). The resulting estimate is about 700 workers, or eleven.8 of Amazon's Ohio workforce. We were unable to observe any research or information on Amazon workers' availing themselves of food stamps in other states.
PolicyMatters Ohio sent us figures to corroborate their claims, which they received from the Ohio Department of Job and Family Services. (That data is available for download in spreadsheet form here.) Further, whether or not an individual qualifies for food stamps is determined by more than only income. Having a gross monthly household income at or beneath 130 percent of the federal poverty limit is an important cistron. Still, you can also authorize for SNAP benefits with an income to a higher place the poverty limit if someone in your household is disabled or elderly, and the poverty limit is pro-rated depending on the size of your household.
Another cistron to consider is whether a worker is employed by Amazon on a full-time or part-time ground. Someone whose only source of income was their part-time chore at an Amazon fulfillment center would earn a lower monthly income than a full-time worker in a similar position, even if they received the aforementioned hourly wage.
This circumstance might well qualify someone for food stamps fifty-fifty if their hourly wage at Amazon were otherwise not too bad. In an electronic mail, an Amazon spokesperson told us that "Amazon full-time hourly employees in Ohio earn between $14.50 and $15 an hour equally a starting wage with regular pay increases plus Amazon stock and performance based bonuses."
On 1 February 2018, Amazon'due south jobs web site listed vii open up warehouse positions in Ohio. Just i was full-fourth dimension, a description which a company spokesperson told u.s.a. entails 40 hours of work per week. The hourly wage for the function-time jobs ranged from $ten.50 to $11.75, while a "reduced time" position came with a starting rate of between $14.50 and $17 an hour. The full-time position had a starting hourly wage of betwixt $14.fifty and $fifteen.
According to a major 2016 report by the non-profit Plant for Local Self-Reliance, a group that advocates for more sustainable community development, Amazon'south warehouse workers beyond 11 metropolitan areas in the United States earned, on average, 15 percent lower than could be expected for a worker in that industry (page 39).
Amazon told u.s. this analysis was "flawed," considering information technology compared Amazon wages with "traditional warehouse jobs and bounty," claiming that the appropriate comparing would be betwixt Amazon wages and retail wages, because "that industry more closely resembles the environment of an Amazon fulfillment center."
Additionally, the study's authors said information technology was difficult to ascertain exactly what proportion of warehouse workers were on permanent contracts, and what proportion were temps, but estimated (based on news reports and the industry average) that the permanent to temporary ratio was roughly 60/forty.
A spokesperson for the company gave contradictory figures, saying: "Throughout the year on boilerplate, 90 pct of assembly across the company's U.Southward. fulfillment network are regular, full-time employees. That applies for states similar Ohio." The spokesperson confirmed that "regular" means permanent. The ILSR criticized Amazon for using the label "seasonal" — which has connotations of the annual retail vacation blitz — to describe the temporary positions it fills year-circular.
Amazon has also previously come nether burn for what have been described as difficult working conditions. In its 2016 report, the ILSR summarized employment at the company's fulfillment centers as "grueling work for lower pay than average":
Employees draw running across warehouses that sprawl the distance of 17 football fields; production quotas, or "rates," that tin can be prepare 60 per centum higher than the industry standard; and a disciplinary arrangement that tracks workers' every activeness and inflicts "points" for whatever deviation from Amazon's standard.
Underlying these conditions is Amazon's key approach to its warehouse workers. The company'due south warehouses are finely-tuned machines, and the company creates weather such that its workers are expected to be parts of that auto. The result is a work environs that is profoundly dehumanizing.
In response to these descriptions, a spokesperson for the company told united states:
Like almost companies, nosotros have performance expectations for every Amazon employee and we measure bodily operation against those expectations. Associate functioning is measured and evaluated over a long period of time equally we know that a variety of things could impact the power to see expectations in any given twenty-four hour period or hour. We support people who are non performing to the levels expected with dedicated coaching to assistance them improve.
While the meme says that Amazon grossed $128 billion in sales "last year," that number is not quite accurate. For one thing, Amazon'southward 2017 earnings had not still been published in January 2018, when the meme was created. Instead, Grit Mail service, where the meme appears to take originated, said in a listing of sources that they had used Amazon'southward 2016 numbers. Amazon actually had net (non gross) sales of $136 billion in 2016, according to the company's full yr fiscal results. This means gross sales (which were not reported) were fifty-fifty college than that, and certainly college than the $128 billion claimed in the meme.
Amazon'due south sales for 2017 are likely to be astronomical.Based on the company's predictions for the terminal 3 months of the year, Amazon'south full-year internet sales in 2017 might accomplish around $178 billion.
Source: https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/amazon-employees-food-stamps/
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