Amazon workers say they struggle to pay for food and rent

FFive years after Amazon.com Inc. raised wages to $15 an hour, half of the warehouse workers interviewed by researchers say they have trouble buying enough food or a place to live.

The national study, published Wednesday by the University of Illinois Chicago’s Center for Urban Economic Developmentasked US employees about their economic well-being, including whether they had skipped meals, gone hungry or were worried about being able to pay their rent or mortgage.

Fifty-three percent of respondents reported experiencing one or more forms of food insecurity in the previous three months, and 48% experienced one or more forms of housing insecurity. Workers who said they took unpaid time off after being injured on the job were more likely to report problems paying their bills, researchers found.

“It’s not necessarily that Amazon is an exception,” said Sanjay Pinto, co-author of the to study with Beth Gutélio. Still, “they are certainly not taking the lead in creating family-sustaining jobs.”

In an emailed statement, Amazon spokesman Steve Kelly called the researchers’ methodology “deeply flawed” and said the company tried to raise its concerns with the study’s authors but never received a response.

“It is a survey that ignores best research practices, has limited verification safeguards to confirm that respondents are Amazon employees, and does not prevent multiple responses from the same person,” he said. Kelly added that Amazon has increased the average wage to $20.50 per hour and offers a range of benefits, including medical, dental, 401(k) and prepaid tuition.

Amazon has long been criticized for its treatment of employees, especially those who pack and ship boxes in its warehouses. Much of the criticism has focused on injuries that exceeded the logistics sector peer rate. Amazon has committed to making its warehouses safer, in part by automating aspects of work that require repetitive movements. Pinto and Gutélio examined injuries among Amazon ranks in a report published in October, before focusing on workers’ economic circumstances.

The Seattle-based company is the second-largest private-sector employer in the U.S., behind Walmart Inc. Amazon represents about 29% of the U.S. warehouse industry’s workforce, researchers estimate. As such, the company plays a leading role in setting wages and working conditions in a sector transformed by e-commerce.

The 98-question online survey sought out Amazon employees through social media advertising, targeting warehouses and neighborhoods that house company facilities. The researchers also performed quality checks to eliminate responses from people who appeared to be giving inauthentic responses.

A total of 1,484 workers in 42 states provided enough information to be included in the results. For the portions dealing with economic security, the sample size varied between 1,306 and 1,472 respondents. The margin of error was plus or minus 2.5 percentage points. The work was funded by the Ford Foundation, Oxfam America and the pro-labor nonprofit National Employment Law Project.

One-third of respondents reported using government-funded programs – primarily food stamps or Medicaid – in the past three months. This echoes a 2020 analysis from the US Government Accountability Office, that found Amazon was among the largest employers of people receiving food assistance in nine states that released the data.

The average Amazon employee in the U.S. will earn $45,613 in 2023, up from $41,762 the previous year, the company said in a filing last month. The company says warehouse and transportation employees earn, on average, more than $20.50 per hour. The survey, conducted between April and August 2023, excluded managers and scaled back a bit: Most respondents reported salaries of $16 to $20 per hour.

About 65% of workers who come to Amazon earn more than they did at their previous employer, research shows. And the same percentage of workers report receiving a raise while working at the company. Climbing the ranks of Amazon’s assembly line, like warehouses, is a most difficult proposal: Only 13% of workers reported receiving a promotion during their time at the company, survey data showed.

Respondents who joined Amazon from another company were more likely to have previously worked in food preparation and services, sales, and manufacturing.

“The Amazon story is a sad story of American workers’ declining expectations of their employer,” said study co-author Gutelius, a longtime logistics and warehouse labor researcher.