Bank of America announced Tuesday that it would raise the minimum hourly wage for its employees to $ 25 by 2025.
The Charlotte, North Carolina-based banking giant is the latest US company to raise the minimum wage for its workers as the country recovers from the COVID-19 pandemic that resulted in massive layoffs last year.
The Biden government is pushing for a national minimum wage of $ 15 an hour, and McDonald’s, Walmart, Starbucks and Amazon have also announced their hourly increases.
Governors in at least 10 states have announced that they will no longer accept the federal government’s expanded unemployment program, which includes $ 300 in weekly benefits. Many of the Republican leaders in these states claim that the extra federal money has driven low-wage workers to make more money when they are not working, as some employers say they are struggling to find workers.
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Bank of America raised its U.S. minimum wage to $ 20 an hour in March 2020, and the company said it will require all of its U.S. vendors to provide at least $ 15 to their employees whose work is dedicated to the bank – Dollars to be paid per hour.
Sheri Bronstein, Bank of America’s chief human resources officer, said the company aims to provide “strong pay and competitive benefits” to help employees’ families and to attract and retain the best talent.
“A core tenet of responsible growth is our commitment to being a great place to work, which means investing in the people who serve our customers,” said Bronstein.
In April, the bank posted a profit of $ 8.1 billion in the first quarter, far exceeding Wall Street estimates.
The bank increased its hourly minimum hourly wage from $ 15 to $ 17 an hour in 2019.
At $ 25 an hour, a full-time employee working 40 hours a week would make $ 52,000 a year. That’s a 25 percent increase in the company’s current minimum wage, equivalent to an annual salary of $ 41,600.
Bank of America, like many banks, has shortened its business hours for customers; some branches close at 4 p.m. on weekdays.
The bank has around 66 million private and small businesses and 4,300 retail financial centers.
Bank of America’s minimum wage is nearly three times the state minimum wage of $ 7.25 an hour.
A government report from the impartial Congressional Budget Office in February concluded that raising the minimum wage to $ 15 an hour would raise the incomes of millions of Americans and lift 900,000 people out of poverty.
By 2025, if the federal hourly rate hit $ 15, on a proposal before Congress, about 1.4 million Americans would work less, the report said. That’s because higher wages would increase the cost of producing goods and services, and in response, many employers would reduce their workforce or hire fewer employees, the report said.
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