Retail companies don't have to choose between high wages and high profits, argues a new report from the researchers at Demos.
In Retail’s Hidden Potential, policy analyst Catherine Ruetschlin says that higher wages across the retail industry would create jobs and reduce poverty without cutting significantly into employers’ profit margins.
Black Friday has heaped new pressure on big box stores to bump up worker pay, with a group of Walmart employees plotting a walkout on the country’s biggest shopping day and the think tank Demos releasing a study Monday that touts the benefits of higher wages.
Henry Ford famously decided in 1914 to pay many of his workers the then incredible sum of five dollars a day, which was substantially higher than the prevailing wage at the time.
NEW YORK -- With $4 trillion in annual revenue, over 15 million employees and projections to be one of the largest sources of new jobs in the next decade, the retail sector plays a vital role in the economy, wielding great influence over the living standards for many Americans.
A study by Demos, a liberal research center, found that a median-income couple that invested in 401(k)’s for 40 years with fees averaging 1.6 percent a year would achieve $354,850 in assets at average savings rates, but only after paying $154,794 in investment fees.
